


Flat Dreams

by PengyChan



Series: Flat World [1]
Category: Flatland - Edwin A. Abbott, Gravity Falls
Genre: Backstory, Crossover, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-20
Updated: 2016-05-13
Packaged: 2018-05-21 23:28:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 53,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6062122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PengyChan/pseuds/PengyChan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bill came into existence in a tightly regulated world, and it chafed him raw. But he never thought there may be other dimensions out there, until he found the memoirs of someone long gone…</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Enter Bill Cipher

**Author's Note:**

> “You think those chains are tight? Imagine living in the Second Dimension. Flat minds in a flat world with flat dreams. I liberated my dimension!”  
> – Bill Cipher, Gravity Falls
> 
> "Prometheus up in Spaceland was bound for bringing down fire for mortals, but I–poor Flatland Prometheus–lie here in prison for bringing down nothing to my countrymen. Yet I exist in the hope that these memoirs, in some manner, I know not how, may find their way to the minds of humanity in Some Dimension, and may stir up a race of rebels who shall refuse to be confined to limited Dimensionality.”  
> – A Square, Flatland
> 
> ***
> 
> This is based on the premise that Bill’s dimension was Flatland - a two-dimensional, strictly-regulated world inhabited by geometric figures, where each one’s place in society is determined by the number of their sides. The whole story is told through the memoirs of A Square, who is shown the existence of a tridimensional world - only to be imprisoned by authorities to keep him from speaking of it. Said memoirs are exactly how Bill will find out about other dimensions, too.  
> The parts written in italics are lifted straight from Flatland, by Edwin A. Abbott.

_Our Soldiers and Lowest Class of Workmen are Triangles with two equal sides, each about eleven inches long, and a base or third side so short [...] With us, as with you, these Triangles are distinguished from others by being called Isosceles.  
Rarely - in proportion to the vast numbers of Isosceles births - is a genuine and certifiable Equal-Sided Triangle produced from Isosceles parents_.

* * *

“Is it true? Is it?”

“I know he was born last week, but--”

“Are his sides all equal? All three of them? An actual Regular?”

“That will be for the Board to decide.”

“It has been so long since last time I saw a Regular come from our kind!”

“I want to see him! Mom, mom! Can we se--”

“Make way! Make way! Don’t you all have duties to return to?”

The small crowd of Isosceles scatters immediately, gone as though it has never been, to make way for the seven members of the Sanitary and Social Board - Squares, for the most part, but it includes a couple of Pentagons and even an Hexagon - stepping before the house.

“Acute-angled rabble,” the Hexagon mutters, but truth be told he is pleased to see the Isosceles’ excitement over the birth - the possible birth, as it was not verified - of a true Equilateral Triangle from their own. It keeps them hoping, keeps them from despairing. Something to be avoided at all costs, as from desperation comes rebellion, and from rebellion, chaos.

And that, indeed, is to be avoided at all costs.

* * *

_The occasional emergence of an Equilateral from the ranks of his serf-born ancestors is welcomed, not only by the poor serfs themselves, as a gleam of light and hope shed upon the monotonous squalor of their existence, but also by the Aristocracy at large; for all the higher classes are well aware that these rare phenomena, while they do little or nothing to vulgarize their own privileges, serve as almost useful barrier against revolution from below._

* * *

This occurrence - a Regular born from the lowest class - is rare enough, and usually the result of hard work for improvement, generation after generation. Strict control, well-thought-out intermarriages and constant effort to improve the intellect and shape are essential for any line whose desire is to produce, someday, a superior form.

The Sanitary and Social Board sees no evidence of a such work in the Isosceles who opens the door, identifying himself as the father of the infant. He has the humbleness befitting his brethren - a Worker, this one, not a Soldier - but that is all that can be said for him. His base is wretchedly short, the angle all too acute even by his kind’s low standards. The wife is - as all females - a straight line. Their words and gestures bespeak the lack of intelligence of the low.

The Board would expect the the offspring of such ill-endowed parents to be itself unfortunate, if not Irregular. And yet, the infant staring up at them - eye wide and wandering, as though trying to take in all that there is to be seen in the barren room - is, quite obviously, not an Irregular.

Careful examination and mensurations, carried on with as much rigour as it is possible while dealing with a child trying to snatch the measuring tape from their hands, confirms as much.

With six votes out of seven, the infant is passed into the class of the Equal-Sided. He also gets to keep the measuring tape, having eaten it as soon as a square got distracted.

* * *

_After a strict examination conducted by the Sanitary and Social Board, the infant, if certified as Regular, is with solemn ceremonial admitted into the class of Equilaterals. He is then immediately taken from his proud yet sorrowing parents and adopted by some childless Equilateral, who is bound by oath never to permit the child henceforth to enter his former home or so much as to look upon his relations again, for fear lest the freshly developed organism may, by force of unconscious imitation, fall back again into his hereditary level._

* * *

The Equilaterals who obtain custody of the infant are not childless, but may very well be. Their own child - their only son - is an Irregular, none of his sides and angles matching the others. He tends to lean on one side, his gait as irregular as his form as a result. The wretched thing is kept at home, away from scorn and to be more closely observed. It his hoped his irregularity may fix itself over time, before the Inspection, just enough so that he may be allowed to live, even if his place in life will never be less than miserable.

It is a hard life, that of the Irregular, so much that termination is often the kinder option even if dreaded - but if one like that is shown in a positive light, what will become of the Laws of Nature?

He remains out of sight when authorities present his parents with the infant; out of sight is where most of his time is spent. They are both overjoyed to raise a proper child, and promptly pledge to stick to the rules that dictate no contact between him and his family of origins is to take place. 

Some jokes are made that they may as well have made a swap, giving poor irregular Liam away in exchange for Bill, this perfect Equilateral that has come from such a low line.

That does not happen. They raise both, although it is clear where their favor lies, and they strive to keep them separated as much as they can, as though afraid their defective offspring may taint this one, and thus both may be lost.

Their attempts are doomed from the start, however. Liam craves companionship.

Bill just _craves_.


	2. Liam

_"The Irregular," they say, "is from his birth scouted by his own parents, derided by his brothers and sisters, neglected by the domestics, scorned and suspected by society, and excluded from all posts of responsibility, trust, and useful activity. His every movement is jealously watched by the police till he comes of age and presents himself for inspection; then he is either destroyed, if he is found to exceed the fixed margin of deviation, at an uninteresting occupation for a miserable stipend; obliged to live and board at the office, and to take even his vacation under close supervision; what wonder that human nature, even in the best and purest, is embittered and perverted by such surroundings!"_

* * *

Liam was neither embittered nor perverted, but might have been, if left on his own with shame, scorn and suspicion hanging over him, and the knowledge the Inspection would someday decide what would become of him - dead, or low of the lowest. Loneliness would had been the final straw to make him succumb.

But there was Bill. The perfect Equilateral, quick thinker, smooth talker, a bag of tricks and mischief who could talk them both out of anything; perfect tradesman material, their father said. Hard to be bored, then, harder yet to feel lonely. Impossible to resent him for taking the spot that should have been his.

Impossible to resent him for anything, or almost. But Circles, could he be annoying. And persistent. And, most of all, nosy. A dangerous combination, that, when the less questions you ask the better it is for you.

"Whatcha reading?"

Liam winced, and the book very nearly fell from his hands. "Bill! You startled me!"

"Meant to," Bill quipped, and sat on the edge of Liam's bed. He was still short, no more than five inches, and his feet didn't touch the ground, so he let them dangle instead. "So, whatcha reading?"

"A love story," Liam quickly lied, and it was enough to make Bill roll his eye, the loss of interest perfectly evident. He took advantage of that moment to put the book away. The cover was indeed that of a love story, to stay on the safe side, but the contents were quite different, and a whole lot more dangerous.

"Dad says it's really stupid," Bill was saying. "Says you've got to pick the best bloodlines so your kids can get more sides and rise up."

Liam couldn't quite hold back the snort that left him. "Didn't keep me from coming out an Irregular, did it? And your line did nothing to get better. You happened by chance."

He hadn't meant his remark to come out as schathing as he did, but Bill didn't seem to mind either way. "By chance," he repeated, as though trying out a foreign word. He seemed fascinated by the idea, and it was enough to make Liam feel uneasy. The concept of anything happening by chance was a dangerous and unsettling one in itself - probably the main reason why Irregulars like him were so frowned upon - and Bill could land both of them in trouble if he said what he had just heard in front of anyone.

"Forget what I just said. Billy, I'm serious," he added, reaching to grab Bill's arm to press the point home. He wasn't even supposed to come see him unsupervised; if either of their parents found out he had sneaked out of his room to get to Liam's, they wouldn't be happy about it at all. "Never repeat that - never speak of chances - in front of anyone else. Understand?"

A moment of silence, then, "... Okay. So, things can happen even if they're not planned?"

"You just promised you wouldn't talk of it in front of anyone."

"Nope. I said I wouldn't do it in front of anyone _else_. That excludes you."

Oh, Circles, already bringing up clauses. He was going to make a fine tradesman alright.

"Bill, seriously-"

"Tell me more! C'mon! I won't say anything to anyone else if you tell me more!" Bill said, a whiny note in his voice. "Can things really happen even if you didn't plan it? Just happen? All sort of things?"

With a sigh, Liam finally caved in. Maybe, if he just spoke clearly, Bill would lose interest in the idea and forget all about it soon enough. If he refused, then there was no chance of it happening. It was how Bill worked: deny him anything, and it would become his greatest desire. That, too, could become dangerous: anyone striving for anything different from their assigned lot in life was likely to be considered subversive, and possibly terminated.

"Yes, they can. How else would Irregulars happen?" Liam said, and was unable to keep some bitterness out of his voice. That, and a fair share of fear. "But things are not supposed to happen by chance. I was not _supposed_ to happen. That's why the Inspection has got to happen, to check if my irregularity got… any better."

But it hadn't, Liam knew as much. All of his sides and angles were hopelessly mismatched, to the point nothing could be done even at the Irregular Hospital, and they had sent him back home with the hope it might fix itself over time to at least a more acceptable degree.

When the Inspection came, and it would come without warning, failing it would mean only one thing - termination. The thought chilled him to the core, but Bill was unconcerned.

"Still worried for that dumb Inspection? Don't be a chicken," he said, giving his side - the shortest one - a light punch. "You'll be fine. When they see how smart you are, you being a freak won't matter anymore."

Most would mistake that for optimism, but Liam knew better: it was simply boundless confidence. Bill believed him to be more than what his irregularity deemed him to be - he didn't seem to realize just how revolutionary that thought was in itself, how removed from the system they were part of - and simply didn't contemplate the possibility anyone may think otherwise.

But Liam was older, and he knew better. Things weren't the way Bill thought they were, and he couldn't will them to be any different.

Yet.

* * *

_Let the advocates of a falsely called Philanthropy plead as they may for the abrogation of the Irregular Penal Laws, I for my part have never known an Irregular who was not also what Nature evidently intended him to be-a hypocrite, a misanthropist, and, up to the limits of his power, a perpetrator of all manner of mischief._

* * *

"Stop eating my things!"

"But it's tasty!"

"You're crazy. Spit that out! Spit- eew, not on me!"

"Should have said that!"

"Why did you do it?"

"'Cause I could."

"You're a pain in the angle."

"Aww, love you too."

Liam scowled at Bill's grating laugh and glanced at the door. "Keep it down," he hissed. If their parents heard them, they'd get really angry that Bill was once again in his room without supervision. "They'll _hear_!"

"Yeah, yeah. And get mad and make noise. Big deal," Bill said, dropping down on Liam's bed. Easy for him to say that - they hardly ever got really mad at him, regardless what he did. But maybe it wouldn't have changed anything if they did: Bill seemed unconcerned about most things. A laugh, shrug it off, carry on.

"Maybe I should get mad and make noise. You ruined my book," Liam grumbled, sitting as well. His irregularity made it hard for him to stand for long without toppling, one of the reasons why reading was a lot easier than most other activities for him.

"Hey, don't make me feel bad."

"You never feel bad," Liam remarked. Sure, it was an unimportant book - he kept the important ones well hidden, because if any was found it would spell ruin even for a Regular, and death for him - but it was no reason for Bill to chew it.

"You read that book already anyway. I'll get a new one," Bill said, sitting up again. He hardly, if ever, was still for long - which was good, because that way he was around enough for both.

Getting out of the house is no fun when people look at you funny and you know authorities must be watching every step. If Liam needed something, Bill would be the one to go out and buy it - sometimes for less than the usual price, because he kept haggling until he got a better deal, and in those cases he'd be allowed to keep any extra change. Their father said it was perfect, since he was going to grow up to be a tradesman as all triangles did, and tradesmen are supposed to always get the best deal. Not that Liam would know. They had never taught him how to do that. What would be the point?

"As long as it's not another jokes book."

"You're no fun. Hey, how do you call an angle that's adorable?"

"Billy, no."

"A _cute_ angle!"

"I am embarrassed on your behalf."

Bill, who clearly didn't even know the meaning of embarrassment, just laughed. It was a grating laugh, sure enough, but also the only laugh Liam heard on a regular basis, so he didn't mind.

That was also the last time he'd hear it, but he had no way of knowing as he watched Bill leave, a spring in his step, to get a book that Liam would never read.

But Bill would, and their world would rue that day for eons to come.

* * *

_Expediency therefore concurs with Nature in stamping the seal of its approval upon Regularity of conformation: nor has the Law been backward in seconding their efforts. "Irregularity of Figure" means with us the same as, or more than, a combination of moral obliquity and criminality with you, and is treated accordingly._

* * *

"Oh, Billy! I didn't see you there. Back again, huh? And it hasn't even been a week!"

The bookstore's owner was, as all tradesmen, a Triangle himself. He was old and moved slowly, but his mind was still all there, and he was a lot of fun to bargain with.

"I'm looking for a book."

"Oh, I see. What kind of book?"

Bill shrugged. "Don't know yet. Something for Liam. Not a jokes book, though, 'cause he's not fun at all."

A laugh. "Look no further, then! I have just the book for him - it was delivered this morning. Liam had sent me a note to request it. You wait here and no mischief, alright?"

"Sure," Bill said, and waited until he had disappeared in the back of the shop before he switched a few of the books from one section to another: he had crossed his fingers when he had promised, so it didn't count.

Busy as he was switching as many as possible in the shortest time, he didn't realize that the shopkeeper was taking an unusually long time to come back - far more than he would have needed if he had kept the book with most of the others in the back. When he returned, he was holding under his arm a book wrapped in brown paper and twine.

"Here you go," he said, holding it out, and Bill reached to take him. He blinked.

"Why is it all wrapped up?" he asked, and didn't notice the shopkeeper's frame tensing for a moment before he spoke again.

"Well, let's say it is a surprise for Liam."

"But you said he sent a note asking for this one. Then he wouldn't be surprised at all, right?"

The other Triangle leaned down and spoke in a low voice. "Ah, but he'll be surprised if you don't tell him this is the book he requested, don't you think?"

That was a good point. "Right! I'll tell him it's a jokes book, so he'll be surprised when he opens it!"

Another laugh. "Good boy! Well now, run home and don't open it, all right? Let Liam unwrap it, so he'll be surprised. Promise?"

"Hu-uh. How much is it?" Bill asked, looking up and already anticipating yet another round of haggling for the price, but this time he was to be disappointed.

"Nothing, nothing. Your brother paid for it in full already. Oh, but there is something you could do before you go."

"What?"

The shopkeeper leaned down, his eye a scant inch away from Bill's. Suddenly, he looked a lot less friendly. "You put all those books back in place, or _so help me_."

… Well. Fair enough.

* * *

_Advocating therefore a VIA MEDIA, I would lay down no fixed or absolute line of demarcation; but at the period when the frame is just beginning to set, and when the Medical Board has reported that recovery is improbable, I would suggest that the Irregular offspring be painlessly and mercifully consumed._

* * *

No one actually told Bill what had happened. He pieced it together, though, when he returned home to find that Liam was gone, his room's door locked, his parents refusing to discuss the matter. He pieced it together with the wrapped-up book, Liam's surprise, still clutched in his hands.

There was incredulity at first, rendering him unable to speak in the face of a staggering sense of finality - and then there had been screeching fury. It was like he had found himself with something amiss - like an angle had been bent out of shape, or a side distorted, making Bill an Irregular as well. None of it had visibly happened, but something was gone all the same, and it seemed impossible that neither of his parents - no one else at all - felt the same way.

"But Liam was smart! Real smart! He could have-"

"He could nothing. He was an Irregular. Nothing would have been enough to change that. It didn't matter."

"But-"

"Bill, enough. The law is harsh, but it is the _law_. There is nothing to argue."

That had been all, the only explanation given before life moved on, as though Liam had never been. His old room now locked, all Bill had left was the book that never made it to him on time.

He unwrapped it in Liam's place. He read it.

And that changed everything.

* * *

_It was the last day but one of the 1999th year of our era, and the first day of the Long Vacation. Having amused myself till a late hour with my favourite recreation of Geometry, I had retired to rest with an unsolved problem in my mind. In the night I had a dream…_


	3. Revelation

_It was in old days, with our learned men, an interesting and oft-investigate question, "What is the origin of light?" and the solution of it has been repeatedly attempted, with no other result than to crowd our lunatic asylums with the would-be solvers. Hence, after fruitless attempts to suppress such investigations indirectly by making them liable to a heavy tax, the Legislature, in comparatively recent times, absolutely prohibited them.  
I-alas, I alone in Flatland-know now only too well the true solution of this mysterious problem; but my knowledge cannot be made intelligible to a single one of my countrymen; and I am mocked at-I, the sole possessor of the truths of Space and of the theory of the introduction of Light from the world of three Dimensions-as if I were the maddest of the mad!_

* * *

The door opened with a slight creaking sound, the lock having given in to his pin with a clack. Bill paused for a moment, listening for the slightest sign anyone had heard, but there was nothing, and he pushed the door open just enough to slip inside of Liam's room.

Everything was like it had been last time he had seen it. The remains in the book he had chewed on were in the bin near the bed, where Liam had let it drop. Everything else was undisturbed, nothing out of place. No signs of a fight. Either his parents had tidied up the room before locking it up, or Liam had offered no resistance.

Bill wasn't certain which option was worse, and he resorted for not thinking about it. He was there for a reason, after all.

He steadied his resolve, and closed the door behind himself as quietly as possible.

There were several shelves filled with books in Liam's room, but none of those seemed out of the ordinary. Nothing like the one he had read, that was certain: even _he_ could tell that book was not supposed to be in anyone's possession.

It had taken him several nights to go through it - not due to being a slow reader, but because he would pause at each page, eye wide, trying to wrap his mind around what he was reading. Was there really another world out there - even several others? Three-dimensional ones? He couldn't even begin to imagine what a _third_ dimension would entice, as he couldn't even begin to imagine what this thing called _color_ would look like. He had never heard of it before now, couldn't even imagine it, but the thought alone filled him with more longing than he'd ever felt before.

What if he could actually visit this place, this third dimension? Would it be the kind of place where everything was possible, where things could truly happen by chance and not be considered a mistake?

… Would Liam's irregularity not have mattered in a such place?

Bill was snapped from such thoughts when his hands finally found something - the edge of a loose board on the wall behind the head of Liam's bed.

_Not a bad hiding place, Brainiac, but predictable._

It came out of the wall with little effort, and there it was - a pile of books. Most of them were on old theories on the existence of light, or recounts of the Chromatic Wars of old, and yet more things he had never heard of. And at the very back there was a notebook filled with… wait, were those _numbers_?

A noise somewhere outside startled him, and he quickly took the books out before placing the board back in place. He had a similar hiding place in his own room, though for now he had only used it for sweets, and he supposed it would do. He didn't want to get in Liam's room even again, but what he had left behind was coming with him.

When Bill returned to his room he was staggering slightly under the pile of tomes. He was tired, his eye scratchy with the lack of sleep, but it didn't matter. It didn't matter at all.

He had a lot more to read about, and a code to break.

* * *

_How admirable is the Law of Compensation! And how perfect a proof of the natural fitness and, I may almost say, the divine origin of the aristocratic constitution of the States of Flatland! By a juidicious use of this Law of Nature, the Polygons and Circles are almost always able to stifle sedition in its very cradle, taking advantage of the irrepressible and boundless hopefulness of the human mind._

* * *

"Therefore, when it comes to contracts, you ought to make sure both parties- Bill, are you listening?"

Bill's eye snapped open, and he found himself facing his father's worried look over the accountancy book they were going through at the shop's counter. Well, at least the one they were _supposed_ to be going through. Bill had dozed off… at some point, he guessed, though he wasn't sure when. "It wasn't something about cheese houses, was it?"

His father frowned and reached to rest a hand above Bill's eye. "Are you ill, son? I've been wondering for a while now. You seem tired. Aren't you sleeping well?"

_Well, no. Forbidden books to read, a code that refuses to be cracked and thinking of other dimensions at night with make it kinda difficult for you, Pops_. _Rebellious phases are tiring._

Of course, that answer was so out of question it wasn't even funny. Bill just shrugged.

"I'm okay. Just not sleeping too well," he said. Truth was that, even if he wasn't that tired, he probably wouldn't have been interested anyway. Learning how to deal with clients was fun, and he was good at it - even more so when there was some haggling or downright swindling to go - but now there was so much more on his mind. Focusing on something like that seemed just impossible.

Relief was plain in his father's gaze. "Good. But if you're feeling ill, tell me and I'll take you to a hospital for good check-up. Better safe than sorry - don't know what I'd do if anything happened to you."

_But you let them take Liam away_.

Bill forced himself to chase away the thought. "I'll put you through something _worse_. I'm staying right here," he said. _For now_ , he thought.

Because he would find a way out of that world, if it was the last thing he'd ever do. He'd make it out, see the world of three dimensions, and watch the colors until his eye was too tired to look on anymore. He'd see it all, for both of them.

Until then, he'd bid his time.

* * *

_Even the utterance of any word denoting Colour, except by the Circles or by qualified scientific teachers, was punished by a severe penalty. Only at our University in some of the very highest and most esoteric classes-which I myself have never been privileged to attend-it is understood that the sparing use of Colour is still sanctioned for the purpose of illustrating some of the deeper problems of mathematics. But of this I can only speak from hearsay._

* * *

_Hi, Bill._

Bill froze, eye fixed on the words he had just written on the otherwise blank sheet of paper. His gaze moved from it to the other sheet of paper, one covered in numbers he had found wedged in the notebook and that he had used to try cracking Liam's code. And now - after yet another sleepless night, crumpled-up remains of his previous attempts on the floor all around him - he knew he had found the right key to decipher it.

That sheet was not part of Liam's notes. It was a letter.

* * *

Hi, Bill.

If you have found this, I assume the Inspection went as I expected it to, as I was no longer able to destroy it. It gets kind of tiresome, writing your last letter anew every week. I'll be relieved when I no longer have to do it, whatever the outcome may be.

If you have found this, then you have also found my books. I knew you'd come snooping around, sooner or later, and that if someone were to decipher my code it would to be you. You're such a pain in the angle, Bill. Never giving up. Not even on me.

There is not much else to add, and I'm not good with words - you always did enough talking for us both. All I know is in these books and in my notes. There is something out there, something so much bigger than you or I could even imagine. A whole universe of _possibilities_ , and some chosen can even visit it. The Circles are all too aware of it, but this knowledge is forbidden, as I'm certain you must have worked out by now.

Whatever you decide to do with this knowledge is up to you. I can only urge you to be careful. And if you ever get a chance to see what I can only read of, promise me you'll take a good look for both of us. I always wished I could see the colors.

Neither of us was supposed to happen, by all accounts. We defy logic as this dimension defines it. Perhaps it wouldn't be too crazy to think you might take it a few steps further. You're weird enough to do it - Irregular as I am, just as unfit for this world, but they can't see it. An undercover Irregular, if you will. It is a good cover you have. Don't shed it.

Stay safe,  
Liam.

* * *

He read it again and again, until he was no longer sure it was tiredness that made his eye burn. Finally, he folded it and placed it back in his hiding place, where he kept all the books and notes he had taken from Liam's room.

A day would come when that letter and the books would be lost amidst chaos along with the rest of their world, but not just yet.

* * *

_I declared that I could say nothing more, and that I must commit myself to the Truth, whose cause would surely prevail in the end._

* * *

"Hey, old man. You're gonna break in two if you keep that up. Ain't it time to retire?"

The elderly shopkeeper - whose name, while rarely used, was Randall - looked up from the pile of books he was putting back in place. There was no sign of recognition in his eye, but Bill was not surprised. It had been quite a while since last time he had seen him, and he had gone from a kid to… well, not fully an adult yet, but close enough. Old enough to demand answers, either way - more than what Liam had left behind could give him. He had spent years memorizing every last line of his books and notes; now it was about time to step up.

"May I help you, sir?" Randall asked, setting the books aside. He had looked old last time, but now he looked positively ancient.

It would be a _long_ time later that Bill would revise his concept of _ancient_. Still unaware of it, he just shrugged. "Think you might, yeah. Good thing I came in right before the bookshop closed, huh?" Bill said, taking a look around. No one was in there except for the two of them.

Perfect.

"But the shop is not-"

"It is now," Bill cut him off, and closed the door behind him. A turn of the key, a flip of the sign, and he knew no one would bother them. He liked distractions - liked them a lot - but they were best when they didn't get in the way of business. Not of his business, anyway. "Gotta love it when timing works for you."

The look in the other's eye went from perplexed to alarmed. He stepped back.

"If you mean to steal from me-" he began, only to trail off when Bill waved his hand.

"Whoa, whoa, stop right there. Hey, heard that?"

"Heard… what?"

"My heart shattering in itty bitty pieces, that's what. Is this how you greet an old friend? Calling him a thief?" Bill sniffled in mock hurt. "I don't steal, old man. I make fair deals. Aaand occasionally swindle an idiot or two, but usually everyone's happy."

The older Triangle seemed to relax, but only slightly. "Then… I am sorry, sir, but I don't know who you are. Forgive an old man's failing memory and remind me."

Bill reached to tip his hat - a gift from his father, and a predictable one, since trinkets like hats and ties were what he sold for a living; at least no one could accuse them of being anything less than snappy dressers - and gave a mock bow. "Name's Bill Cipher. Ring a bell?"

It clearly did, for Randall's eye widened. "Oh, Circles - Billy? Is it really you?"

"... Did I stutter the 'name's Bill Cipher' part? Was sure I hadn't. I rehearsed it and all before coming in."

Randall finally laughed, but it was easy to tell it wasn't a wholehearted one, and Bill could very easily guess the reason why. "No wonder I didn't recognize you, then. My, how you've grown. I hadn't seen you since-"

"Since Liam was taken. He didn't get to open his surprise, in case you were wondering. I did, though. I sure was _surprised_ , I can tell you," Bill cut him off, leaning on the wall, and he wasn't at all surprised _now_ , when Randall took a staggering step back. "See, this is why it's lucky for both of us this store is closed right now. Can't really discuss your dealing of forbidden books in front of the public, can we? I mean, we could, but then we'd wind up imprisoned or worse before we can even finish, and that would be one major pain in the angle."

"Billy-"

" _Bill_ , thanks. And… look, can you stop staring like I'm gonna bite you? It's kinda distracting."

"Uh… sorry."

"Thaaat's better," Bill said, and reached to put a hand on his back, leading him further into the store. "Now… where was I again? Oh, right. Liam's surprise. Nice trick, that - made me think there was a joke going on that I was part of. You knew telling me anything else would have been an invitation for me to open it, huh?"

"But you did open it."

"Liam wasn't there to do it anymore by the time I returned. May have just missed him. Maybe I wouldn't have if I didn't have to stay and put your dumb books back in place, but hey - then _they_ might have checked out the book and none of us would be here today. I kinda like being alive. So let bygones be bygones and tell me - did you get Brainiac more of those books? I found quite a stash in his room."

Randall drew in a deep breath. "If you speak of this with anyone-"

"Haven't so far and won't start now. I ain't my brother, Randy, but I ain't dumb either. Getting myself locked up for isn't among my short, medium or even long term plans. There are things I'd like to do before that. Seeing the colors, visiting this Third Dimension, give the Big Chiefs of this dump of a world a lesson, learn to play the piano. In no particular order."

There was a moment of silence, then Randall gave an odd sort of laugh. "I did wonder if those books would ever be found after Liam was gone, but I took all steps to make sure they could not be traced back to me. I didn't expect fate to interfere and lead you to it."

"Not fate. _Chance_ ," Bill corrected him. "Thanks to your amateur mistake of using _me_ as a middle man. Should have sorted out your business on your own instead of relying on a kid. So, it _was_ you to provide the rest of them."

"Yes. Being an Irregular, Liam was often watched. He couldn't join us here, but he wanted to know - so I took steps to take the knowledge out to him. He understood the risks, but-"

"Hey, hey, rewind," Bill said, stopping in his tracks and forcing Randall to do the same. "Us?"

Randall turned to face him in full. He had done the same last time they had met, but this time Bill stood just as tall. "You and I are not the only ones who know about the Third Dimension. There are more like us scattered all over this world, and more texts to be found, to comprehend. This shop is one meeting point, the one closest to the capital. I can introduce you to it, Bill, if so you wish. But you need to be certain."

Bill straightened himself. "Sure I am. Certain is my middle name."

"Wasn't it Norman?"

"... We're _not_ talking about that."

This time, Randall's laugh sounded more sincere. "Very well. We meet the second Thursday of each month after closing time - that will be next week. We'll share all we know of the Third Dimension with you. You will need to knock thrice, and bring something with you."

"Oooh, get it! Like, a token of commitment or something? The heart of an enemy? Their eye? A pound of flesh?"

Randall blinked. "No, I- I meant something to eat or drink - what in the Circles is _wrong_ with you?"

Bill rolled his eye. "You guys suddenly sound a lot less fun."

"We're not here for fun, Bill. It is for knowledge, and for the hope of a better future, of a free world."

"... And food and drinks."

"Those can never hurt."

"You've got me there. Hey, I can make great Martini. Would that work?"

"Oh, absolutely. And, Bill?" he added, putting a hand on his back. "We have yet to unlock the mysteries of the Third Dimension, and if there is a way for anyone to go there - anyone but the lucky one chosen by the Sphere at the turn of the Millennium - we have yet to find it. As of now, we lack the power to change what ought to be changed in this world. But there is one of your wishes I can make come true right away."

"Can you teach me how to play the piano?"

"... That, too. But I was referring to something else - something whose secret we mastered recently enough. I can show you _colors_ , here and now."

_And if you ever get a chance to see what I can only read of, promise me you'll take a good look for both of us. I always wished I could see the colors._

For a moment, Bill could think of nothing to say; an unusual occurrence, that. When he heard himself speaking, it felt as though his own voice was coming from a mile away.

"... Show me," was all he said, and followed Randall in the back of the shop, and then through a movable shelf.

* * *

_Elsewhere in Flatland, Colour is no non-existent. The art of making it is known to only one living person, the Chief Circle for the time being; and by him it is handed down on his death-bed to none but his Successor. One manufactory alone produces it; and, lest the secret should be betrayed, the Workmen are annually consumed, and fresh ones introduced._

* * *

His eye hurt, but he couldn't look away.

Dimly, from very far away, he heard Randall saying something on how he shouldn't stare too long, how the untrained eye might find the sight too hard to bear. He said something on needing time to adjust, but Bill didn't listen to one single word.

Before him, on a section of the wall at the end of the room, were splashes of color - of all sorts of colors. Some were darker and some more vibrant, and his eye was drawn on the brightest of all, the one that was painful to look at.

A day would come when Bill Cipher would know the names of each color in all languages ever conceived in any dimension existing. In a dimension close enough to his - and yet so very far - the color he was staring would someday be known to some as 'yellow'.

To Bill Cipher, right there and then, it was simply the first true glimpse at a wider universe.

* * *

_I glanced at the half-hour glass. The last sands had fallen.  
_ _The third Millennium had begun._


	4. Reasonable

_I heard the sound of many voices in the street commanding silence. Then followed a louder voice. It was a herald's proclamation. Listening attentively, I recognized the words of the Resolution of the Council, enjoining the arrest, imprisonment, or execution of any one who should pervert the minds of people by delusions, and by professing to have received revelations from another World._

* * *

"Hey, are you gonna knock or what? I don't have all night."

"Eep!"

Bill felt just a touch smug when the square before him - a _tilted_ square, which was a bit of an oddity but nothing unheard of, and not a problem as long as all sides were equal - gave a yelp and very nearly jumped out of his frame. He turned to look at him, eye wide, pressing himself against the bookstore's door. He had been standing there for a bit, unaware of Bill's presence behind him, as though he was trying to work up the courage to reach up and knock.

Except that Bill had no time nor patience to wait.

"Friend of Randall's?" he asked. Knowing what he did, it was easy enough to guess the guy had to be there for the meeting, too: no reason to be that nervous otherwise.

The guy seemed to relax just a fraction. "You know him?" he asked in a voice that Bill found kind of funny, squeaky as it was. It took him a bit off an effort not to laugh.

"Yeah. Invited me to today's party, so to speak. I make a killer Martini," he said, and that seemed to calm the guy a big deal. Then again, Bill couldn't have made the reason of his presence even clearer without spelling it out for him.

"Randall did mention someone would be joining us today," he said.

"That'd be me. Name's Bill," he added, holding out his hand. Squares were a class above him - that of lawyers, doctors and such, which belonged to those with four or more sides but below aristocracy - and he was not supposed to be that casual, with no 'sir' thrown in: an approach like that on the job would have resulted with a perplexed look at the very least, and a client leaving to never return.

Except that he wasn't on the job now, was he?

A nod, the the other just reached out to shake his hand. Good to see he wasn't the only one not to care for formalities.

"I'm Kryptos."

"Great to meet ya and all that. So, we're supposed to knock thrice, right?"

"Yes. I was waiting for my cousin Tad, really, but…" Kryptos paused, looking around, then shrugged. "He's probably in already, or late. Yeah, let's just get in," he added, and turned to knock thrice, making sure to let a couple of seconds pass between each knock. As they stood waiting for someone to open, Bill spoke again.

"So, how long have you been on board?"

"Not long, really. Less than half a year. I was the last one to join - before you, I mean. Tad introduced me - that's how people usually get in, anyway. Got to be known by someone who's already in, to make sure they can be trusted," Kryptos said with a slight frown, and glanced at Bill. "Who introduced you, anyway?"

"... You could say my brother did."

The door creaked open before Kryptos could say anything of it, and Randall stood in the doorway, gesturing for them to come inside - and quickly, too, because you're never too careful, even when the street empty aside from them.

"The others are already in, except for Nora and Esther, but they should be coming soon," he said, closing the door behind them. Bill blinked.

"You've got women here as well?" he asked. That was unusual, as women were not allowed to know how to even read or count. That made Bill's mother virtually useless for anything but housekeeping and rearing children; he couldn't imagine someone with her same level of knowledge being of any use in an organization like that.

"Two fine examples on how the Circles' laws are folly," Randall said, intent on locking the door. "And probably our most important allies. You will see. Kryptos, take him to meet the rest; I'll wait here for their knock."

"Sure. Follow me, Bill."

He followed.

* * *

_About three hundred years ago, it was decreed by the Chief Circle that, since women are deficient in Reason but abundant in Emotion, they ought no longer to be treated as rational, nor receive any mental education. The consequence was that they were no longer taught to read, nor even to master Arithmetic enough to enable them to count the angles of their husband or children; and hence they sensibly declined during each generation in intellectual power. And this system of female non-education or quietism still prevails._

* * *

The others turned out to be a group of four people - a Square, a Pentagon, a Hexagon and, to Bill's surprise, even an Octagon. That was high class right there, one of those who'd be all too happy to maintain things as they were. What in the world was a guy like that doing there?

"Hey, guys," Kryptos called out, causing them to stop talking to one another and turn to the door. They were in the secret room Randall had shown him previously, the splashes of color still on the wall at the far end, and Bill had to make a conscious effort to keep his eye off them: they were just too intense, and that wasn't the right moment to get his eye sore. "This is Bill - the new guy Randall told us about."

Huh. Right. He was supposed to say something now, wasn't he? That was where all of his smooth talking and eloquence had to come into play, after all.

"... Hey. Looking good. I make great Martini," was the brilliant result.

Ah well.

There was a laugh, and it came from the Octagon. "That makes for an interesting addition! Welcome, welcome. My name is Hillmann," he said, holding out his hand. Bill shook it, and nodded to the others as well.

"Great to meet ya. Got to call the lot of you 'sir', or we can leave formalities out of the door?"

The Square - Kryptos' cousin Tad, Bill supposed, laughed as well. "Hah! You bet we can. This world can keep its rules out of here. I'm Tad. Five-sides here is Pentos," he added, gesturing to the Pentagon by his side. "My recommendation if you ever need a good lawyer, by the way. May not help too much if we're all caught here, though."

"Welcome on board," Pentos said, ignoring the quip. "Hope you're not lying about that Martini."

Bill waved his hand. " _Noooo_ way. Will sell my mother for a Binominal bar, but wouldn't lie about that. Honest. Sort of."

A snicker. "This guy speaks my language," Tad said, and turned again. "Hey, are you going to say hi, or you're just going to be the usual pain in the angle?"

With a sigh and a roll of his eye, the last person in the room - an Hexagon - finally stepped forward and held out his hand. "Pleased to make your acquaintance," he said. "My name is C-C-Croatoan."

Bill reached to shake his hand. "Got a bit of a stutter there, huh?"

"No, I don't," was the reply. "My father did, and the guy at the Register Office was a jerk."

On hindsight, maybe laughing wouldn't make for the best possible first impression. But Bill didn't precisely excel at foresight - by the time _would_ , he'd simply not care about much of anything anymore - so, of course, he laughed. Loudly.

"Really, guys? _Really_?" C-C-Croatoan said when a few more snickers were heard from the rest of the group. "This is getting _old_. "

"Sorry, sorry," Kryptos said, wiping a tear of mirth from his eye. "It's just that-"

"Oooh, so that's the new guy!" a new voice rang out, causing everyone to turn to the door. Randall was walking in, along with two straight lines - two women, clearly. They were hard to see when looked at upfront, thin as they were; the typical swaying gait was what made them visible from the front and back.

"Yeah. My name's-" Bill began, but immediately trailed off when the woman who had just spoken came to stand right before him, eye fixed in his.

"No, no, don't tell me!" she said, lifting her arms above him. "I can read your mind, and I see your name is Bill!"

"She can't actually read your mind," the other one said, a hint of amusement in her voice. "Randall already told us."

A sigh. "You ruin everything, Esther."

"That's what big sisters do."

The first one rolled her eye. "Spoilsport," she said, dropping her arms, and held out her hand to Bill. "I'm Nora."

Bill reached to shake it. "I'm Hermann."

"Nice to meet- wait, wasn't it Bill?"

"What, can't read my mind?"

She chuckled and turned to her sister. "I like this one. He's weird."

Randall cleared his throat, getting everyone's attention back to him. "Thank you all for coming," he said, closing the secret door behind him. "Nora, Esther, how long can you stay."

"A couple of hours at least," Esther replied. Her voice was more like a murmur than her sister's shrill. "We're off to our monthly evening at the theater, remember?"

"And we'll be sniffling and crying when we return home," Nora added. "Because the play was moving and we're so _emotional_."

A few snickers rose up in the room.

"Doesn't anyone ever ask what plays you went to see?" C-C-Croatoan muttered. Nora made a movement that looked much like a shrug.

"Father doesn't waste time talking about _female_ things."

"I make sure to read the synopsis of whatever is in the theaters, just in case," Esther said. "And a certain someone should do the same."

"Why should I? You've got it all covered so well!"

… Wait a second. "You two can read?" Bill asked. He had wondered about that before, and it sure was unusual - maybe even more unusual than his own birth from Isosceles, and forbidden to boot.

"Our father taught us," Esther replied. "He also taught us Arithmetics. He was worried the lack of intellectual exercise through generations on the female line could result with hidden Irregularities, and we're his only children. Nothing terrifies him more than the thought of an Irregular grandchild. He decided it was worth the risk of bending some rules."

"Didn't expect us to stick our points in his private library, though. Taking the books out of the house be too risky, but we can copy them," Nora said. "He thinks we spend a lot of time writing on our diaries or something. Because we're so _emotional_ ," she added with a dramatic sigh. Another few chuckles were heard.

"Nora and Esther's father is a one hundred-sided Polygon, and a highly respected scholar," Tad explained to Bill's benefit, causing him to blink. With a hundred sides he was, while still below a Circle, nothing short of aristocracy. "He has access to texts we'd never have a chance to get our hands on otherwise - some of the deepest secrets of mathematics and, after some trial and error, we were able to obtain color," he added, gesturing towards the wall at the far end of the room. "We-"

"Aren't we getting a bit ahead of ourselves?" Kryptos spoke up. When everyone's gaze turned on him, he seemed a bit uneasy. "I mean, Bill just got here. There's a lot to explain, and we don't know how much he knows yet."

"Agreed," Randall said, and put a hand on Bill's back. "Come now. You'll tell us what Liam's books have taught you, and we'll take it from here. Are you ready to listen?"

He was.

* * *

_Why will you refuse to listen to reason? I had hoped to find in you-as being a man of sense and an accomplished mathematician-a fit apostle for the Gospel of the Three Dimensions, which I am allowed to preach once only in a thousand years: but now I know not how to convince you. Stay, I have it. Deeds, and not words, shall proclaim the truth. Listen, my friend._

* * *

For the two years that followed, the monthly meetings were the one thing Bill Cipher truly looked forward to. The things he learned were countless; the possibilities that opened up to his imagination astonishing. The more he knew, the more he _needed_ to know.

Little else of what happened meanwhile had much or any importance at all, compared to the knowledge he was offered, and the companionship of like-minded people. He grew into the official adult age, his father passed away not long afterwards, and he took full control of the business. He was good at it - great at selling and even better at haggling good deals with suppliers - and his activity flourished.

Not so for his mother, who passed away not too long after her husband. Bill made arrangements for the funeral and did not attend, as he had not attended his father's. Business came first, had been the explanation. Maybe it was true, up to a certain point, but it was not all.

_You let them take Liam away._

A couple of other traders mentioned, more than once, that they had daughters the right age to marry. Bill pretended not to get the message and sent them their way. Now that the house was his own, he had no intention to share it with anyone else.

Liam's old room remained locked.

* * *

 _Our physicians have discovered that the small and tender sides of an infant Polygon of the higher class can be fractured, and his whole frame re-set, with such exactness that a Polygon of two or three hundred sides sometimes-by no means always, for the process is attended with serious risk-but sometimes overleaps two or three hundred generations, and as it were double at a stroke, the number of his progenitors and the nobility of his descent.  
_ _Many a promising child is sacrificed in this way. Scarcely one out of ten survives._

* * *

"Have you ever thought of looking for your family, Bill? I mean, your… the original one?"

The question was unexpected, and came after a long discussion speculating who precisely was the Sphere and who, or what, allowed it to visit their world. Why only once at the turn of each Millennium? Was it truly always the same Sphere, and if so, how could it live so long? Would it come at the turn of their Millennium, two hundred years from then? And how was the Apostle of the Gospel of Three Dimensions chosen - what made anyone worthy of being picked, alone every thousand years, to know and see the Third Dimension?

A lot of questions and, frustratingly enough, not many answers; it felt to him they had hit a wall when it came to knowledge, and the fact he couldn't know more gnawed at him.

At least Nora's question just now, however unexpected, was one he could answer.

"No," he said, swirling his glass a bit. The others were not looking at him, but he knew they were listening. No one else was speaking at the moment, anyway. "Never thought about it."

"I could look them up for you," Pentos spoke up. He was a lawyer, known for trying - rarely with success, but he _tried_ \- to overturn destruction sentences for Irregulars in court. As far as Bill knew, Liam hadn't had the privilege of a waiting time before the sentence was carried out. "There are registers of all Regulars born from Isosceles. I can access to them and find out who they are."

Bill shrugged and put the glass down. "Thanks, but no."

"Aren't you even curious?" Kryptos asked. He sounded somewhat confused. "You could have siblings you don't know, or-"

"Not interested," Bill cut him off, and ignored Randall's look. He shrugged and lifted his hands. "Already had one. Didn't end well," he said. It was true that he had never thought about it, but now that he had, he could tell he had no wish to find out just what else their world's precious _rules_ had taken from him.

Not until he had the means to make sure they were no more.

A brief silence followed. Finally, it was C-C-Croatoan to stand. "It seems I must take my leave. I have a delicate procedure to perform tomorrow. Not one I enjoy performing, but you'll understand I must be at my best."

A few grim looks followed him to the door. He was a surgeon, and they all knew what kind of procedure he was referring to.

"The more sides you gain, the more insane you get, or so it looks like," Tad finally said, breaking the grim silence. "No offense, Hill."

"None taken," Hillmann said, bitterness plain in his voice. Being higher than any of the in the hierarchy of classes had not spared him an Irregular son, whose case Pentos had argued in court. He had managed to save the boy, but his lot in life would remain meager.

"This world is rotten through," Esther said bitterly. "Sometimes I think the Sphere should come to destroy it at the next turn of the Millennium. What is the point in revealing the Truth to one and only one, every thousand years? One who's likely to be imprisoned or worse before he has a chance to spread it?"

"But word has been spread regardless," Randall pointed out. "We are here, as are others like us. We know-"

"That's great. And what are we gonna _do_ with that knowledge?" Bill snapped, causing Randall to trail off. Several eyes turned to him, and he returned each gaze. "We've learned a lot. That's smashing, don't get me wrong, but what now? The Sphere comes once every thousand years, Circles know _how_ , to speak with some random guy, and then leaves - again, Circles know _how_. And it's not gonna be back within our lifetimes, either. Don't know about you, but I ain't going to spend it in wait for something I won't be alive to see. Since you keep saying that knowledge is the best weapon, Randy, isn't it about time we use it?"

Randall's look turned into a glare. "It seems I was wrong in the assumption knowledge begets wisdom," the said coldly. "A wrong move may result with us being found out."

"Afraid to lose what years of life you've left, old man?"

"What I am afraid may happen is that all that we know - all that we have gathered - may be lost with us, and then there would really be no hope," Randall retorted.

"Hope for _who_ , if we're not going to do anything? For whoever lucks out and is born close to the next turn of the Millennium, with a slim chance of running into the Sphere already knowing who it is? What's in it for us, then?"

"This is not about us," Randall said. A hint of rage was starting to show beneath the disdain. "And it is not about _you_ , or what's in it for _you_. We need to be reasonable, Bill."

"Reasonable," Bill repeated, and laughed. Somehow, the whole thing was really funny. "Sure thing. Law is harsh, but it is the law."

"Bill-"

"This whole world is nothing but reasonable, if you listen to what they say," Bill snapped, cutting him off, and stood. No one else moved, all eyes still fixed on him. "Weeding out Irregulars is _reasonable_. Keeping women from reading is _reasonable_. Your place in life depends on your sides and angles - that is also _reasonable_. Giving any Regular born from Isosceles up for adoption with other Regulars is _reasonable_. Killing nine Polygon newborns out of ten trying to make Circles out of them is _reasonable_. Hey, Hillmann, what about your kid?" Bill asked, glancing at the Octagon. "Miserable lot in life but hey, he's alive. Not allowing him to breed is also _reasonable_ , right? Like that? Willing to keep it as it is, just in case someone in some two hundred years gets a better shot? Oh, and if that fails again, no worries! We get another shot after another thousand years! Shame your line won't get to see it, since you'll never have grandkids!"

Hillmann looked away and said nothing. Tad stood as well. "Bill, I think you're-"

"Not tired of losing case after case, Tad?" Bill cut him off, causing him to stiffen. "All those Irregulars, and you can barely save any. But hey, give it a couple of centuries and maybe, just maybe, something will work out better than it did the last three times! Doesn't that make you feel better? It's _reasona-_!"

Tad was faster than Bill's eye could follow, and he had no time to brace himself, let alone to try avoiding the blow. It hit him straight in the eye and sent him tumbling back and then on the floor, the room around him exploding in a flash of white-hot pain. There were a few exclamations, someone speaking, but it was hardly more than background noise Bill couldn't be bothered listening to, aware of nothing but the pain and the cold floor beneath him.

Whatever they were saying didn't matter. Unless someone actually did something, unless someone was willing to risk it, not one word they uttered would mean _anything_.

* * *

_And yet at times my spirit was too strong for me, and I gave vent to dangerous utterances. Already I was considered heterodox if not treasonable, and I was keenly alive to the danger of my position; nevertheless I could not at times refrain from bursting out into suspicious or half-seditious utterances, even among the highest Polygonal or Circular society._


	5. Rejection

Bill did not attend the next meeting. Nor the one after that.

If they were too cowardly to do anything with the knowledge they had been hoarding, then _fine_. He had learned from them all he could, anyway, and he was not a coward. He was willing to risk it. Let them sit on their lower sides and do nothing while he found a way to use what he had learned to change everything. He would, somehow, come what may.

He didn’t need them. He didn’t need anyone.

* * *

_If my Readers have followed me with any attention up to this point, they will not be surprised to hear that life is somewhat dull in Flatland. I do not, of course, mean that there are not battles, conspiracies, tumults, factions, and all those other phenomena which are supposed to make History interesting; nor would I deny that the strange mixture of the problems of life and the problems of Mathematics, continually inducing conjecture and giving an opportunity of immediate verification, imparts to our existence a zest which you in Spaceland can hardly comprehend. I speak now from the aesthetic and artistic point of view when I say that life with us is dull; aesthetically and artistically, very dull indeed._

* * *

“I’m still not entirely sure, Mr. Cipher. I mean, I like both, but it’s hard to pick just one, if you know what I mean.”

“Oh, sure thing. Black or white? Though choice, that.”

The sarcasm from Bill’s part went entirely over the client’s head, but it was to be expected: how would one who had never seen colors - maybe never imagined they existed - even pick that up?

_Flat minds in a flat world. How fitting._

“Yes, precisely,” the Hexagon said, entirely unaware of Bill’s thoughts. He held a walking cane in each hand, as though to compare their weight. “Which one would you say is the most striking?”

“My money’s on the one you bash on someone’s angle.”

That made the client laugh. “Hah! I may be tempted, next time I meet a few of my esteemed colleagues, but I suspect it would cause me more trouble than it would be worth,” he said, and turned his attention to the canes again. “Decisions, decisions,” he murmured, his eye narrowed in thought, and Bill had to refrain from rolling his. This one was a surgeon, too. If he was that much of a quick thinker on the job, too, Bill couldn’t picture many of his patients leaving the clinic alive.

He let his gaze wander around the store while he waited for the client to make up his mind. His father had left him a shop that mostly dealt in fine clothing, and had been very wary of the idea of changing anything in the way it was run. He had been wary of any kind of change, truth be told.

“Jack of all trades, master of none,” he had muttered when Bill had suggested they could buy the store next door as well and tear down a wall to make a bigger store, where they could deal in more than just hats, ties and fancy trinkets.

 _Better than master of one_ , Bill remembered replying, earning himself a sideways glance and no actual answer. Of course, buying the store next door and making the place bigger had been the first thing he had done once he had taken possession of the business, his father not yet cold in his grave. He had turned the new part of the store in a pawn shop, and it had taken off pretty well. Plus, there may or may not be some money lending going on the side. It was fun, too: made for some interesting bargains and deals.

More interesting than watching some old geezer picking a cane, anyway. There was a guy looking at his miscellaneous merchandize, really, but it was an Isosceles, so he had to give the old man priority - even though he had come in later and was an utter bore.

“If you ask me, it’s not so much about the cane as it’s about how you carry it,” Bill finally said, taking one himself. He leaned on it, tipping his hat. He had taken to wearing a bowtie as well; it looked good on him, if he said so himself. “No offense, but you look kinda like you’re using a crutch. I know you’ve got more class than _that_.”

 _I certainly do_ , he thought. _Half your sides and twice the style_.

That got a laugh out of the Hexagon. “Oh, but I am an old man who could use a crutch, all things considered,” he said, and looked down again. “You know, I think I’ll go for the black one.”

“Great choice,” Bill said, and he even sounded like he meant it. At least it was enough to satisfy the guy and make him pay and leave. Bill had almost feared he’d stay past the closing time, trying to decide between black and white. Just how long would he have stayed if he got to choose from several colors, each of them so bright it made the untrained eye hurt?

Bill scowled. Admittedly, there were a few things he missed of the meeting, and getting to see the colors was one of them. But he had been told how to obtain it, so maybe, if he played his cards right and acquired what he needed without anyone noticing, he could create some himself. After all, a pawn shop would be the ideal cover to get his hands on--

“I’m sorry, sir - may I bother you?”

Bill glanced up to see the Isosceles had approached. Must have waited for the Hexagon to leave for a while, too. Bill put the cane down on the counter.

“Wouldn’t be my job if that was a problem,” he said, entirely ignoring the fact he didn’t have that much of a choice regardless: his shape had put him in the merchant class before he had any idea what any of it may mean. “How canI help?”

“I was wondering if I could suggest a swap,” the Isosceles said, putting a pocket watch down on the counter and then placing something else beside it - a wedding ring. Bill took it and gave it a good look. It wasn’t anything of much value; neither was the pocket watch, which was pretty to look at but not quite old enough to be considered an antique, but it was still worth more than some cheap thing that may as well have come out of a coin machine. Bill didn’t need to bite on it to tell it was not gold.

“Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but unless you can add some money on top--”

“I have this as well,” the Isosceles said quickly, putting another wedding ring on the counter. “My wife’s. They’ve got to be worth somethin’, right?”

“Sentimental value, I guess. Won’t pay any bills, including _this_ one,” Bill muttered, gesturing towards himself, but he did take a look at the second ring. “Okay, I’ll bite. Why the trade? Trouble with the wife?”

The Isosceles’ gaze brightened. “My son was just born. He’s a Regular! A proper Equilateral, just like yourself!”

So he’s gonna be taken from you before you can pick a name, Bill thought, but didn’t say it aloud. He frowned down at the rings, thinking back of Nora’s question.

_Have you ever thought of looking for your family, Bill? I mean, your… the original one?_

“... Congrats,” he heard himself saying. “Didn’t answer though - why the trade?”

Maybe it was just his impression, but some of the brightness seemed to fade from the other’s eye. “He’ll… he’ll be off to his new family soon. Proper Equilaterals as well. Will raise him right. Just kinda hopin’ I can let him have a little something to keep, y’know? ‘Cause we’re so proud of him. Not sure they’re gonna let him keep it, but a man’s gotta try, right?”

His voice broke off some towards the end of the sentence. Bill put the rings back down on the counter.

“Got to risk it, yeah. I can respect that, but these ain’t worth a thing. You can keep ‘em,” he said, and pushed everything - the rings and pocket watch both - towards the Isosceles.

The man blinked. “Sir, the watch--”

“Are you deaf? I said you can _keep ‘em_.”

This time, the Isosceles seemed to get it, at least judging from the way his eye widened. “But I cannot accept--”

“Get out of my shop before I change my mind.”

He did accept, and left in a hurry. Go figure: no one ever passes by the chance to have something for free. Bill allowed himself a moment to wonder if the kid would be allowed to keep that watch.

Probably not, unless his new family kept it hidden from him where it came from: anything that might encourage a new Regular to seek out his birth parents was actively discouraged. Why bother getting anything for a kid who won’t get to keep it unless they’re lied over who bought it to them to begin with?

_‘Cause we’re so proud of him._

_There are registers of all Regulars born from Isosceles. I can access to them and find out who they are_.

Except that he wouldn’t now, because Bill sure wasn’t going to be back crawling to ask that pain in the angle to do it. Not that he wanted him to. He didn’t need to look _them_ up. Bill Cipher didn’t need _anyone_.

He was still trying to get the memory of the encounter out of his mind when jingle of a bell snapped him from his thoughts, and he didn’t bother turning to the door.

“Shop’s closed. Better luck tomo--”

“... Hey, Bill.”

The voice was a known one, as was the tilted shape at the door when Bill turned.

“Kryptos?” he said, then caught himself. “Fancy seeing you here,” he spoke again, his voice cold. “Bet you know the way to the door, _sir_. You’re standing right by it.”

“I just wanted--”

“Shop’s closed.”

“I didn’t want to buy anything. I just--”

“Then you really have no reason to be here. _Sir_ ,” he added, his voice as venomous as he could make it. He hadn’t said a word when he had left, not a word after his stupid cousin had punched him for having the guts to tell it how it was. What in the blazes did he even want now?

Kryptos hesitated, but didn’t leave. “You don’t have to call me that,” he finally said, letting the door close behind him.

“How else would I call you?”

“... I thought _friend_ was it.”

Bill snorted and rolled his eye, but said nothing to it. Instead, he leaned on the cane and tapped his foot. “Fine. What are you here for?”

Kryptos seemed to relax a fraction. “We have talked about what happened, and--”

“Go figure. _Talking_ is all you guys do.”

A scowl, and Kryptos stepped closer. Well, now that was interesting: he was a complete pushover, usually. “Enough now! Be reasonable and let me- hey!” he yelped, stepping back as soon as Bill brought up the cane, holding the tip against his center like a sword. His eye widened, causing Bill to snicker. He looked so scared it was kinda funny.

“Whoa there, slow down. Almost made me think you had guts,” he said, and lowered the cane. “Tell me to be _reasonable_ one more time and this is gonna bash you so hard in the angle you’ll turn into an an inverted triangle. Wait, would you like one? Canes are three secants. I’ll make it five for you,” he added, leaning forward on the cane.

Kryptos gave a bit of a shaky laugh. “Not buying anything, but good to see you’re not too mad.”

“Not in the sense I’m angry, no.”

“Heh. Look, seriously. Can we speak? I’m sorry for what happened back there. We all are. Even Tad,” he added quickly. Bill rolled his eye. Again.

“What, the lawyer’s afraid I could sue him?”

“He didn’t mean to snap. But he’s under a lot of pressure, and… what are you doing?”

“Rolling my eye as much as it’s physically possible.”

“... You’re creepy.”

“And you’re a wimp. More news at eleven,” Bill muttered, but he did finally stop trying to get his eye to make a full turn in the socket and fixed it back on Kryptos.

“Look, I mean it. It’s bad for him, too - all those Irregulars he can’t do anything for - and then you were… well…”

“Honest?”

“A prick.”

“Sounds accurate,” Bill conceded, and crossed his arms. “That cane’s price went up to seven secants.”

This time, it was Kryptos to roll his eye. “Didn’t you hear that I’m not buying anything?”

“Wasn’t listening. And I may have hurt some delicate feelings back there, Kryptos, but I wasn’t lying - no point if you’re not trying to sell stuff. We’ve got to _do_ something, and since you guys aren’t willing to risk it--”

“Not _all_ of us,” Kryptos blurted out. Bill blinked.

“... Come again?”

Kryptos looked around the shop, as though he feared someone may be hidden behind a shelf to listen. “We… we talked about what you said. Randall still thinks it would be too risky with no chance of success, and Pentos and C-C-Croatoan agree with him. Esther, too.”

Well, Bill thought, that left only three names. “Are you telling me you and Hillmann grew a brain?”

“Nora, too.”

“Nora already had one.”

Kryptos sighed, but his sigh ended with something close enough to a smile. It wasn’t that common for someone in their world to have a mouth that was separated from the eye. Kinda fascinating, though not especially practical; it made them a lot easier to read than most, too, with that mouth quirking and twitching all the time.

“So, will you at least hear us out?”

Well. He had nothing to lose but some time, after all.

“... I guess. But there’s a catch if you want me to get back there next week and _not_ punch your cousin in the eye,” he added on a whim, crossing his arms. Kryptos was not a fully qualified lawyer just yet, but he should be able to wriggle his way to the same information Tad had dangled before his eye during the last meeting. “There’s someone I want you to find.”

* * *

_As to the doctrine of the Circles it may briefly be summed up in a single maxim, "Attend to your Configuration." [...] It is the merit of the Circles that they have effectually suppressed those ancient heresies which led men to waste energy and sympathy in the vain belief that conduct depends upon will, effort, training, encouragement, praise, or anything else but Configuration._

* * *

By the time he reached the address Kryptos had given him, Bill had had all the time he needed to get a small speech prepared in his mind. Except he hadn’t done it at all, so he’d improvise.

On other news, water was wet.

The house was shaped octagonal, like all houses were, but definitely smaller than Bill’s own. And older, too. Old walls, old door. Circles knew how many generations had lived there, dying one after another without getting to know or see anything more than whatever sucky job their lot in life had resulted with. Until he had happened, that was it. His shape and the degree of his angles had been his ticket out of there. He was not supposed to ever return.

Which was probably the main reason why he had, come to think of it.

He knocked, and for a few moments there was no response. Then, when he was about to try knocking again, there was a sound of footsteps and the door opened.

The Isosceles standing before him was taller than himself, but most of them were - the result of having such an acute upper angle - and showed signs of aging in the net of wrinkles around the eye. He looked at Bill, and frowned a little. “We don’t buy nothin’.”

… Well, of course he’d think he was there to sell something. Not many more reasons for a tradesman to show at the door of someone of the lowest class. Still, being brushed off like that was kinda annoying.

“Don’t think you’d be able to afford even the worst crap in my shop, so no worries. Not here to sell,” he muttered, crossing his arms. If the statement offended him, the Isosceles didn’t show it. Isosceles were kinda used to it, anyway. He just gave him a rather dumb look and Bill took it as his cue to speak again.

“Mr. Zeebub, am I right?” he asked, and the other nodded.

“Yes. Who…?”

“Name’s Bill Cipher.”

A slight frown of confusion, but no sign of recognition. Made sense, though: if communication was to be avoided, then it wasn’t likely they would be allowed to know the name of the family who raised him after--

“Lou, who is it?”

The door opened a bit further. There was a woman standing there as well, a wary eye on him. More out of habit than anything else - acting a bit more like a gentleman tended to help the sales - Bill reached to tip his hat. “Bill Cipher,” he said.

“Charmed,” she said, not sounding charmed at all. “What do we owe the visit?”

Billl shrugged. “I figured it was about time I said hi.”

Her eye narrowed, then she seemed to hesitate. Somehow, she seemed sharper than her husband. “... Have we met?”

“Yeah, you’ve birthed me somewhere along the line.”

 _Smooth, Cipher. Real smooth_.

The woman stared. The man stared. Bill shifted a little.

Maybe he _should_ have thought of some way to break the news beforehand, after all. “... Shoulda brought chocolate or something, I gue--”

“You must be mistaken. We never had any sons.”

… Wait, what?

Bill blinked, and for a moment he could only watch when the Isosceles turned away to step back inside - but he did recover quickly enough to jam his cane through the door before the woman could close it. “Whoa, whoa, wait up. I’m looking for Lou Zeebub and his wife, and he said--”

“It is us, yes,” the woman cut him off. “But you’re mistaken, sir. We never had a son.”

For a moment - only one moment - Bill thought that maybe Kryptos was even more of an idiot than he thought, that he got the wrong names. But then the woman’s gaze met his, and something was falling from her eye to splash on the ground. When she spoke again, her voice was oddly broken.

“You shouldn’t be here. Please, leave.”

Bill scowled. “Seriously? That’s it? You haven’t seen me since I was born, and all you can tell me now is to leave--”

“You could lose _everything_. Please. Be reasonable!”

 _Reasonable_.

There was a laugh, and it took Bill a few moments to realize it was coming from him. When realization hit, he found himself laughing even harder.

 _Your place in life depends on your sides and angles - that is also_ reasonable _. Giving any Regular born from Isosceles up for adoption with other Regulars is_ reasonable _._

_The law is harsh, but it is law._

“Hahahahaha! You know what? Good point there,” Bill said, wiping a tear of mirth from his eye. “Yeah, guess you’re right. I’ve got nothing to do with your kind. You’re where you are ‘cause you don’t deserve any better,” he said, and yanked the cane back. “Have a _reasonable_ day,” he added, and turned to leave.

He didn’t hear the door closing, but it didn’t matter and he refused to look back.

* * *

_As things now are, we Males have to lead a kind of bi-lingual, and I may almost say bimental, existence. With Women, we speak of "love," "duty," "right," "wrong," "pity," "hope," and other irrational and emotional conceptions, which have no existence, and the fiction of which has no object except to control feminine exuberances; but among ourselves, and in our books, we have an entirely different vocabulary and I may also say, idiom. "Love" them becomes "the anticipation of benefits"; "duty" becomes "necessity" or "fitness"; and other words are correspondingly transmuted._


	6. Against Time

Bill had many talents, but apologizing and meaning it was not among them. Thankfully, lying convincingly _was_.

Tad answered to his apology with one of his own, and everyone, including old Randall, seemed willing to leave it at that. Bill didn't spare a moment to wonder whether or not Tad's apology was more sincere than his, because it didn't really matter. As far as he was concerned, all those meetings were about now was getting any scrap of knowledge they may uncover - to use for the _other_ meetings, the one he held at his place, with the ones who actually had some guts.

They held them in Liam's old room, which he unlocked for the first time in years. He was sure Liam would have liked that.

* * *

_Now the Irregularity of a Male is a matter of measurement; but as all Women are straight, and therefore visibly Regular so to speak, one has to device some other means of ascertaining what I may call their invisible Irregularity, that is to say their potential Irregularities as regards possible offspring. This is effected by carefully-kept pedigrees, which are preserved and supervised by the State; and without a certified pedigree no Woman is allowed to marry._

* * *

"I just don't recognize her anymore. She gets married, has kids, and suddenly this world is not that bad, suddenly we don't really need to _do_ something. Didn't she say she wanted this world to be better for any kids she may have?"

Nora put her glass down with some more force than it would have been necessary, and it took Bill a conscious effort not to tell her something along the lines of 'you break, you buy'. Beside him, Hillmann sighed.

"I can sort of understand her. Don't look at me like that - when you have children, their safety is your first concern. I would know - had Tad jump through fire hoops to save my boy," he said, his voice somewhat bitter. Bill glanced around Liam's room, thought back of their parents' silence on the matter - how they hadn't tried to do _anything_ to save him - and said nothing.

"Perhaps you'd understand if you had children," Hillmann was going on. "Esther must have thought long and hard about the risks they may run if she's ever caught. Her kids are Regulars, male and Polygons to boot. Their future is secured, but one slip from her part might change that and make them lose everything."

_You could lose everything. Please. Be reasonable!_

"Great excuse, that," Bill heard himself muttering.

"Bill-" Kryptos began, but it was Nora to cut him off.

"No, I'm with him on this one. It's ridiculous. We all have something to lose, but it can't be an excuse to get absolutely nothing done."

That was enough to shut him up, and Hillmann didn't add anything, either.

Nora was a good asset to have on their side: more knowledgeable in mathematics than any of them, due to sticking her eye in her father's book since she was a kid, and in the perfect position to let them on to the most secretive studies among high-level scholars. The most important one, now that Esther had married and moved out of their father's residence, thus losing regular access to his library. Speaking of that...

"Any news on what your father's been breakin' his brain over?" Bill asked, and she frowned, shaking her head.

"No. It's something big, it's got to be. He spends most of his nights in the study, and locks it when he's in and when he goes out. He's never been that secretive before."

Hillmann gave her a worried look. "Do you think he may have realized what you've been doing?"

"Doubtful. He'd have confronted me about it," she said, and she sounded absolutely certain. "A such thing would make him absolutely livid. If he hasn't said anything, then he doesn't know. It's just… he seems really nervous."

Bill and Kryptos exchanged a quick glance. It looked like they both had reached the same conclusion: if the old man was being that careful without having a cause to think there was any need for him to, then whatever he was working on had to be _really_ big.

"And he never lets go of the key, huh?" Bill asked.

"Rarely - and never long enough for me to get in his study without him noticing it's gone, let alone to look into… whatever this is about."

"Long enough to take a cast, though?"

That caused everyone else to pause, and Nora's eye to widen.

"Oh! Hadn't thought about it! Yes, I could do that. I take it you can get a copy of the key out of it?"

"I know someone who could, yes. One who doesn't ask questions."

Hillmann gave a chuckle. "You certainly know interesting people."

"Comes with the whole pawning side business," Bill said with a shrug. "Not half bad, I've got to admit. Just get me the cast, Nora, and you'll have the key. Just don't get caught, okay?"

It wasn't clear whether she winked or blinked - that was always hard to tell - but her voice certainly sounded smug. "I won't. Don't worry."

And indeed, she was not. In three days' time she showed at his shop, pretending to be there to buy something - being a woman had to be great when it came to walking around unnoticed: they all looked precisely the same, regardless their status - and placed the cast on the counter.

"What can I get for this, good sir?" she asked, and Bill laughed.

"A shiny new key, that's what. Will be ready by the end of the week," he said, taking it.

"And what do I get in exchange for whatever I'll unlock with said key? I noticed you've got a nice pendant over there," she added eyeing it from the other side of the shop.

The information she would return with would turn out to be priceless, but Bill had no way of knowing that yet: all he had was a hunch that they were on to something. "Hard to give your a quote without knowing what it's all about. I'd be going about it blind," he said, already knowing that wouldn't end the discussion. Nora could buy any jewel she wanted, so this wasn't so much about the object as it was about the fun of bargaining. Bill kinda like that part, too.

"Take a leap, then," she was saying, leaning on the counter. "Isn't your job all about taking risks, too, Mr. Cipher?"

" _Calculated_ risks."

"Sounds terribly reasonable to me."

This time, they both laughed. There was some more haggling, but Bill had already decided to let her have it before they were halfway through: she was risking it, and that was something he appreciated. In the end, she left his pawn shop still chuckling, the pendant on her like a trophy. She had it on when she came back to collect the key. She had it on at the next meeting at Randall's bookshop, and the one after that at Bill's place.

She still had it when she was caught. In the end, the real price to pay would be so much higher than a pendant - but at least she paid it willingly.

The others would pay because Bill said so.

* * *

_Straightway I became conscious of a Presence in the room, and a chilling breath thrilled through my very being. [...] Looking around in every direction I could see nothing; yet still I felt a Presence, and shivered as the cold whisper came again_.

* * *

"I believe the Circles are looking for the Sphere's entrance point to our dimension."

Nora's statement came out of nowhere, causing everyone in the room to fall silent in the same instant, and - in the brief instant before what he had just heard truly sink in his mind - Bill thought that she sure knew how to drop a bombshell, and that she deserved a tip of the hat for that.

Then what he had heard did sink in, and he could only stare as though frozen on the spot. Somehow, old Randall was the first one to recover.

"What… are you certain? An entrance point?"

Made sense, Bill thought: the Sphere had to get in their dimension from somewhere. They had speculated long ago that there might be a weak spot somewhere, in the line between world, that the Sphere used to come through once every thousand years - but that the Circles had come to the same conclusion and were _looking_ for it… well, that was entirely new.

Nora nodded, everyone's attention on her. They were all there except from Esther, who was staying home for some reason related to her children. She did it an awful lot lately, probably to distance herself some; it only added to the tension between the sisters, if Nora's scowl at the beginning of the meeting was anything to go by.

"This… This can't be good," Kryptos said, glancing nervously at the others. "What do you think they want to do? Move into the Third Dimension?"

"Unlikely," Bill said. Actually visiting the Third Dimension was something he had dreamed of since he had read about it in Liam's books, but he doubted the Circles, apt as they were to hide its existence, would want to visit it as well. They were the ones on top in their dimension, but wouldn't be anything to write home about in the Third. That was why they wanted to keep things as they were: the moment people knew, they would cease to be the pinnacle of everything. "If anything, they probably want to seal it off."

Pentos scowled. "So that the Sphere cannot return at the next turn of the Millennium?"

"And possibly never again," Tad said. "Each time the Sphere has come with its message, the Circles in charge had to scramble to silence whoever spoke of it - and something escaped their control regardless, or else we wouldn't be here. It makes sense that they'd want to solve the matter at its root. It's-"

"Reasonable," Bill quipped, cutting him off. There were a few, weak chuckles.

"Heh. From their point of view, I suppose it is," Tad said.

"We can't let them succeed," Randall spoke up. His hands were shaking; Bill supposed the thought of a such thing happening was enough to make even him decide something had to be done. Well, better late than never, though earlier would have been better yet. "If they seal the opening, then there will be no hope for this world."

The Circles can keep this world, Bill thought. If his visit to his birth family had taught him anything, it was that their world and the idiots in it didn't deserve saving. If they couldn't be bothered to do anything, then why should he? If the chance arose he'd be better off just leaving them all behind to rot and making a run for the Third Dimension.

Still, he knew better than sharing those thoughts with… well, anyone else in there. Some were smarter than others, all well-intentioned, but also so damn _sentimental_. They would never see things his way: they'd sooner stay on the sinking ship, trying to get water out with buckets while the passengers cowered and refused to get on the lifeboats, telling each other how _reasonable_ it was to stay put in their assigned place.

Maybe he'd be able to convince a few of them that it wasn't worth it, one day, but that wasn't the right time to discuss.

"Nora, how close are they?" C-C-Croatoan was asking. "How close do you think your father is to figuring it out?"

"There is still a lot he needs to calculate," Nora said slowly. "But I don't think he's too far away from figuring out the actual coordinates. And once he does, you bet he'll be letting them know in record time - even if he has no idea what they want them for."

"Any way we can talk him into not doing it?" Pentos asked, but of course he already knew the answer, and his suggestion was met with silence - and Bill's eye-roll, though no one seemed to notice.

 _We should silence him_ , he thought, and very nearly said it, but he stopped himself just on time. Not that he didn't think he couldn't get some of them on his side - maybe even Nora, considering the stakes - but because it wouldn't be such a bright idea to begin with. His death would surely attract the attention of those who had tasked him to find the passage point, after all, and that might be too much for them to chew at once.

Plus, he wanted to know where that passage was. He wanted to get through it and into the Third Dimension himself.

 _And if you ever get a chance to see what I can only read of, promise me you'll take a good look for both of us_.

"No," Nora was replying. "He would never go against the Circles. You can get that out of your mind - pretty sure the thought alone might give him an aneurysm. What I can try to do is solving finishing the work before he does."

The skepticism in Pentos' gaze was palpable. "Do you really think you can figure out the coordinates before he does?" he asked. Because of course he would be skeptical: for all their pats on each other's back they couldn't let go the concept, ingrained in them since birth, that women were not made for logical thought - no matter how many times Nora and Esther had proved otherwise.

Was that the same reason why there were no Isosceles among them? Bill had never wondered about that. Not that it mattered. Not now that he had seen how gutless and brainless Isosceles truly were. If anything worthwhile had ever come out of their lot, that was _him_.

"Do you have any better ideas?"

That shut him up. No, he did not - none of them did. In the end, they could only agree that their best shot was letting Nora try getting to the coordinates first. And then… then they'd see.

"I suppose it's all for now," Randall said with a sigh, ending the meeting. But it wasn't, and Bill knew as much the moment Nora slipped something in his hand - a folded piece of paper - before leaving, not even looking at him. It took Bill some… well, a lot of effort to wait until he was alone to read it.

_There is something else you should know. I'll come to your shop tomorrow. Don't tell anyone for now._

Well. It looked like there was something more there - a secret. Bill kinda liked secrets, as long as he happened to be the one who _knew_.

* * *

_Yet, if this evil be not arrested, the gradual diminution of the Circular class may soon become more rapid, and the time may not be far distant when, the race being no longer able to produce a Chief Circle, the Constitution of Flatland must fall._

* * *

"An equation to open up a tear in _time_?"

"Not so loud, Bill. And yes, that's precisely what it looks like"

"That's insane."

"Thought it would be your thing."

"... Fair enough," Bill conceded, and gave a quick look around. There was no one else in the shop and anyone looking in through the window would think he was seeing him showing a client some items, but it didn't hurt to be careful. "Okay. A tear in time. You're saying you can open up a tear in time with math."

Nora rolled her eye. "Everything about this world is about mathematics. It is the fabric of reality itself. It shouldn't surprise you this much."

"And why would your father work on something like that?"

"On that _and_ on the coordinates to the Sphere's entrance point. I have a guess. What's yours?"

Bill did have a guess alright, and he didn't like it at all. "... They can't use the equation just about anywhere, can they?"

"Bingo. No, I don't think it would work anyway. It would need to be used someplace where the fabric of reality is _already_ thin."

"The entrance point."

"Precisely."

The idea of what a such thing would allow the Circles hung unspoken between them for several moments. With the mind's eye, Bill could imagine several options, none of them pleasant. They could travel forward to the next turn of the Millennium and terminate the Sphere the moment if came through or, worse yet, travel back in time to the very first visit - so that, once the Sphere was terminated, none of said visits would have ever happened.

And if they were allowed to do that, then it would be the end. No word of the Third Dimension would make it through, no memoirs nor books would ever be written. The knowledge would be lost, and he would live his whole life never knowing nor longing for anything better.

And that wasn't something Bill was willing to let happen. He'd choose death before that.

"... Do the others know?"

"No. This is too big and we can't mess up. We only get one shot at this. Kryptos loses his nerve too easily, and Hillmann is leaning a bit too much on Esther's side of the argument. I don't know if we can trust him all the way," she said, and handed him something - another piece of paper. "This is the equation. For now, it is useless. Once I'll have figured out where the entrance point is, though, it will change everything. It will take us to the first turn of the Millennium, so we can warn the Sphere."

And see the Third Dimension, Bill thought, but he said nothing and just looked down at the equation. A day would come when a look would be all it took for him to understand everything, but at the moment he had no such power. It was too complicated for him to grasp, too advanced, and all he could do was trust Nora on that one.

“You’ll need to beat them to it,” he said. Theirs was, quite literally, a race against time. 

"I will."

"This involves _time_. Even if they find out after you do, they can still get back in time and-"

"I will burn my father's study to the ground with all of his work once I have the coordinates. With him in it, if necessary. They won't have them."

The silence that followed was longer than the previous one, but not by much. Nora looked away; her voice had been harsh, too harsh not to think it was to mask something else she was trying not to let out. But that was none of his business, and he said nothing of it.

On hindsight - usually when he couldn't fall asleep, eye fixed on the flickering shadows Pyronica's flames cast on the cell's walls - Bill would feel rather stupid for not thinking, even for a moment, that someone could betray them. That someone would talk, for convenience or fear or because forced to, and the rest of them would take the fall.

Some would die. Some would be imprisoned. Some would go into hiding. He would make it to the Third Dimension, one way or another.

For a time, Bill wouldn't be able to tell whether he had been the luckiest or unluckiest of them all.

* * *

_"Whereas the States had been troubled by divers ill-intentioned persons pretending to have received revelations from another World, and professing to produce demonstrations whereby they had instigated to frenzy both themselves and others, it had been for this cause unanimously resolved by the Grand Council that on the first day of each millenary, special injunctions be sent to the Prefects in the several districts of Flatland, to make strict search for such misguided persons, and without formality of mathematical examination, to destroy all such as were Isosceles of any degree, to scourge and imprison any regular Triangle, to cause any Square or Pentagon to be sent to the district Asylum, and to arrest any one of higher rank, sending him straightway to the Capital to be examined and judged by the Council."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A quick note to address to a question is was asked (on something I probably should have clarified sooner, on hindsight), just in case anyone else was wondering the same!
> 
> "The world you describe is like original Flatland. Same hierarchy, same rules. But still, how you describe everything is sounds like third dimension 3d world. Otherwise characters are not suppose to see each other or anything else as anything but lines. So is this 2d or 3d? A combination? Flat figures, 3d world?"
> 
> It is a bit of a combination of the two, yes. While the Second Dimension is heavily based on Flatland, I took a few liberties describing it.  
> If it were precisely as described in the novella, all the characters could see of each other would be lines - no way of seeing each other's eye and by extension expressions. Plus, they wouldn't have any limbs to speak of - while both Bill and Kryptos are shown to have arms and legs. It would be difficult to write and, I think, kind of boring to read, without any sort of expression or gestures being described. (Or maybe someone more talented than me could pull it off, but not me, I am afraid!)  
> There is a lot that is not explained about Flatland in the novella (for example, how the characters can move around with no legs, or write or build or handle just about anything with no hands), so I'm describing it as somewhat different due to necessity. Think of it as a mix - flat figures as Bill appears in GF, in a world that does have some traits of tridimensionality, but is overall characterised by flatness, with no color to speak of. Bit like flat cardboard cut-outs on a black-and-white stage, if you will. That's how I imagine it, anyway.  
> Hope that helped!


	7. The Sphere

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bit if an early update, due to the fact I'll be spending the next few days without access to a computer. On the bright side, I get chocolate eggs. Also my family will be around, which can potentially be great or frustrating. It's usually greatly frustrating.  
> If you celebrate it, have a great Easter!

When it all came crashing down, in was on a Tuesday.

Go figure, Bill would think later: it was always on a Tuesday, regardless the dimension, time and universe. Why Tuesday? Because why the hell not, that's why.

Kind of funny, that.

* * *

_Spell-bound and motionless, I could neither speak nor move to avert the impending destruction; and still the noise grew louder, and the King came closer, when I awoke to find the breakfast-bell recalling me to the realities of Flatland._

* * *

"BILL!"

"Whoa!"

It took a few moments to understand what had precisely happened: one instant he was opening the door of his store and the next he was being pushed in, someone's voice yelling his name so loudly it rang through his mind like a fire drill. He stumbled forward, but managed not to fall - and turned to see Nora slamming the door shut behind her.

"What the-" he began, but the next moment something was shoved in his hands - a sheet of paper.

"The coordinates," Nora breathed, sounding all the world like she had just ran a marathon. She was breathless to the point is sounded like she had to force out every word. Bill would have wondered about that, if he wasn't too busy looking down at the coordinates. It was a place at the outskirts of the capital, not at all far from there - they could reach it in hours. Was that _it_ , the weak point in the fabric of their dimension?

Bill laughed. "It's happening! It's really _happening_! Can't believe it! Now we just-"

"You have to do it alone. They're after me."

He trailed off, and suddenly he didn't feel like laughing anymore. He looked at her in a mute question, and finally noticed - really noticed - how scared she actually looked.

"Wait, what? You mean you got caught?"

"They came home looking from me right after I found the coordinates. I… someone must have told them. Someone must have _spoken_ , because I gave my father no reason to doubt me, and yet they came for me. "

Bill's grip on the sheet of paper clenched, the gravity of the situation finally dawning on him. If someone had spoken, as she had said, then they would come for him soon as well. For him, and for the orders. "... But you got away," he heard himself saying.

"I had to get the coordinates to you. Now that you have both those and the equation, you can actually meet the Sphere. Get it to _do_ something."

"Hey now, don't heap it all on me! We can both-"

"They're _looking_ for me. Coming with you would just put everything at risk. I… my father is gone, too," she said, and her voice shook. "I burned his study as well. I _had_ to, so that they would never have the coordinates. But they know it was me. _I'm_ their priority. You need to go now, before they figure out I passed everything on to you. The others may have already been captured, for all I know - Bill, _please_. You need to go now."

It was sound advice, terribly _reasonable_ , and Bill found himself ignoring it for a few moments longer. "... They'll kill you when they find you. Not without torturing you for information first."

Nora gave a bitter chuckle. "I don't plan on being captured alive."

There was a long moment of silence before Bill spoke again. "They're going to come here soon, I guess. They will be looking for me. Should this place go up in flames like your father's study with a few of them in it, you wouldn't hear me complain."

"... I suppose I may as well go out with a bang, then," Nora said, and gave a brief laugh that had little cheerfulness in it. "And, if they think this was your doing, they might think you died as well. It would give you more time."

"Could give us _both_ more time."

"No. Just you. I didn't come this far to risk it all by trying to get there with half of the Circles' guard after me. Seems only fair, anyway. I burned my father and his life's work, so I may as well end up the same way. He didn't _deserve_ it, and Esther will never forgive me for it. I just… couldn't let him walk away and tell the Circles what he knew."

"No real choice there."

"Don't give me that crap," she snapped, reaching up to wipe her eye. "There is _always_ a choice, regardless what the Circles tell everyone. This was mine. Make it worth _something_."

_You let them take Liam away!_

_Bill, enough. The law is harsh, but it is the law. There is nothing to argue_.

"... I see. You'll find everything you need to take them down with you in the back of the store," Bill said, and reached to hold out his hand. "Been great doing business with you."

Nora gave a noise that sounded much like a laugh and reached to shake his hand. Bill noticed she was wearing the same pendant she had haggled out of him no more than a few weeks earlier. "It's been fun on this end, too. Now finish it. Deal?"

"Deal," Bill said, and left. He didn't turn to look back at her and the store, as he hadn't turned back to look at his birth mother or the miserable house she and her husband lived in. There were so many things he wished to see, and now he had the means to; no reason to keep his eye on what he was leaving behind.

The trap worked, but Bill wasn't there to see it. He wasn't there to see the store go up in flames with everyone in it, the soldiers sent to take him in screaming as they burned, but one day he would get to watch and laugh as the rest of his world met that same fate.

Had Nora lived to see it, she would have regretted ever trusting him.

In the billions of years to follow, many people would.

* * *

_If it indeed be so, that this other Space is really Thoughtland, then take me to that blessed Region where I in Thought shall see the insides of all solid things. There, before my ravished eye, a Cube moving in some altogether new direction, but strictly according to Analogy, so as to make every particle of his interior pass through a new kind of Space, with a wake of its own-shall create a still more perfect perfection than himself, with sixteen terminal Extra-solid angles, and Eight solid Cubes for his Perimeter. And once there, shall we stay our upward course? In that blessed region of Four Dimensions, shall we linger at the threshold of the Fifth, and not enter therein? Ah, no! Let us rather resolve that our ambition shall soar with our corporal ascent. Then, yielding to our intellectual onset, the gates of the Six Dimension shall fly open; after that a Seventh, and then an Eighth-_

* * *

"A dump? _Seriously_?"

Bill looked back down at the coordinates on the sheet of paper and then back up at the heap of junk and broken things, thin trails of smoke rising in the air. That was the place, no doubt about it. Not that he was expecting a golden gate, trumpets and confetti, but it was still kind of a letdown.

The again, the opening must have been there long before someone had the brilliant idea to use the spot as a garbage dump. It sure summed up his world's lack of prospective.

But that was about to _change_.

The coordinates took him to the northern side of the dump. No one was around and there seemed to be nothing remarkable there - not to someone who wasn't there specifically to look for something, anyway. But Bill was there with a purpose, and it didn't take him too long to notice something - what looked like a small heap of stones. It may have been mistaken for just another heap of junk, but upon closer look he could tell it had to be so, so much older than everything else around it.

Had it been something else once, maybe a building? It was hard to tell. Now it was only a heap of white stones… with a single black one in the middle of it, larger than most and smooth to the touch. When Bill reached out to touch it, something that felt like a mild electric charge caused him to tense up. It was gone the next instead, but Bill didn't pause to wonder even for a moment, whether he may have imagined. He knew, just like that, that he was on to something. He _had_ to be.

The sheet of paper with the equation in it was stuffed in his hat and slightly wrinkled when he pulled it out, but it hardly mattered as long as it was readable. Bill held it in one hand, took a sharp white rock with the other, and began writing the equation. The rock was not chalk or anything, but it worked well enough - made the numbers visible, if anything, and he supposed that would be enough.

Not that he'd know, but surely Nora would have warned him if anything more than that was needed, right? Because if he needed to do anything else he had no idea what it would be and it wasn't like he could ask anyone, with her gone and everyone else probably already captured or worse. It wasn't a pleasant thought, but it was cut short almost right away: the moment he finished writing the equation on the stone, the numbers began glowing.

_"Whoa!"_

Bill was forced to take a step back, eye narrowing against the sudden brightness. It was so strong that it made everything around him suddenly look darker, but all Bill could stare at was the black stone turning a glowing yellow and then growing into a wide, gaping hole in the fabric of time itself.

"Hey, what is this?"

"Where is this light coming from?"

Shouts in the distance jolted Bill out of his trance-like state, and he knew he had to move: it wouldn't be long before someone came looking, before authorities were alerted, and if someone caught up with him before he could pass through that open portal in time it would be the end of everything.

_Make it worth something._

_Deal_.

He could see nothing but brightness, no hint of what truly awaited him on the other side of the opening, but it did not matter: anywhere was better than there and _then_.

"... Well, Brainiac. Time to see if I've hit the jackpot," Bill said, and stepped closer. It was as though something had grabbed him, an unseeing force pulling him in, and a moment later he found himself drowning in light - but only for one moment. Then it all turned gray again, and he was _falling_.

Somewhere behind him the light faded, and a black stone returned to being just a black stone.

* * *

_It was now morning, the first hour of the first day of the two thousandth year of our era. Acting, as was their wont, in strict accordance with precedent, the highest Circles of the realm were meeting in solemn conclave, as they had met on the first hour of the first day of the year 1000, and also on the first hour of the first day of the year 0._

* * *

_Thud_.

"Ouch! What the… Oh, c'mon!"

Bill tried to kick himself upright, but he couldn't manage to: he had landed upside down, upper angle stuck firmly on the ground, and his limbs flailed uselessly in the air.

Perfect. Just perfect.

With a sigh, Bill cast a glance around. The dump was gone, and there were no constructions nor people as far as he could see: only empty space, black and white, as far as the eye could see. And then, right next to him, there was the same pile of stones he had seen before… only that now it looked different, newer, and actually had a shape, although it was hard to tell what it was from his uncomfortable position.

So, he was still in the same place… but _when_ was he? Had he really reached the turn of the Millennium, of any Millennium? Would the Sphere be there shortly, emerging from whatever passageway could be opened between the Third Dimension and there?

… And would he be able to kick himself upright again so that he wouldn't greet the messenger from another world with his lower side sticking up? 'Cause that would be great. Presentation is everything. Maybe, if he tried to throw all of his weight on one side...

"Alright. There we go, Cipher. One, two- whoa!"

A sudden, powerful gust of wind threw him several meters back without warning. He landed on his back with a yelp, but at least he wasn't stuck anymore, and he could sit up just on time to see something opening up just where the stone structure stood: an X-shaped tear stretching across the ground like a yawning mouth, a myriad of colors Bill had never seen swirling within it, so intense it made his eye ache.

And it was from that whirlwind of color and motion that the Sphere emerged.

* * *

_Henceforth I have to relate the story of my miserable Fall: most miserable, yet surely most undeserved! For why should the thirst for knowledge be aroused, only to be disappointed and punished? My volition shrinks from the painful task of recalling my humiliation; yet, like a second Prometheus, I will endure this and worse, if by any means I may arouse in the interiors of Plane and Solid Humanity a spirit of rebellion against the Conceit which would limit our Dimensions to Two or Three or any number short of Infinity._

* * *

"... Whoa."

It wasn't the smartest thing that had ever left Bill's mouth - or eye, that kinda depended on which he had out at the moment - but to be honest, right then in that instant he didn't really know what else to _say_. The Sphere, the three-dimensional being he could only read of, the one said to visit their dimension at the turn of each Millennium - and he was close enough to almost touch it.

Well. Would have been if he hadn't been thrown several meters back. Still, close enough to see it was precisely as described - thousands of circles together to form a perfect shape of three dimensions. Close enough for the Sphere to hear him and turn, its eye resting on him just as he stood.

_Presentation is all, Cipher. Play it cool._

"Hiya," Bill said, waving.

 _Nailed it_.

There was a long moment of silence as they stared at each other. When the Sphere spoke, it was as though its voice was coming from everywhere at once. "Are you not shocked? Surely, a tridimension being defies all you know."

Bill shrugged, feeling just a touch smug. Alright, _very_ smug. "I read a lot about you. There are memoirs of others who met you before and all. Not that you're not impressive, but I came prepared."

The Sphere's eye narrowed, and it regarded him with something not too far away from suspicion. "You certainly jest. This day marks the very first visit my kind is permitted to pay to your dimension."

… Oh. Right. That was the first turn of the Millennium, just like Nora had said. For a moment Bill thought he should compliment her next time he saw her, except that the next he realized he would never see her again. Or the others, most likely. The thought nagged at him some; it was nothing anywhere close to what Liam's loss had been like, but it was still a shame that none of them was there with him to see what he was seeing, to share their victory.

"It's a long story, really," Bill finally said. "The short version is, I've travelled back a few Millennia to warn you. Look, your approach - this whole 'one apostle every millennium thing' - ain't gonna fly. The Circles are going to pass laws to silence all of them, so if we want to get something done you need to speak to more than just-"

"SILENCE!"

The Sphere's voice was loud as thunder, and caused Bill to flinch back. Its eye was wide with incredulity and… wait, was that anger?

"If what you're telling me is true, then you're a _fool_. Time is not yours or mine to tinker with. Do you even realize whose anger you have aroused?"

Bill scowled. "Seriously? Is that all you've got to say? Look, I've pissed off my fair share of people coming here, but now you've got to listen-"

" _You_ listen," the Sphere cut him off, hovering closer and forcing Bill to step back. "If there is any sense left in you, you'll leave now. Run. Get as far away as you can from the passage and pray they won't pursue you further. I am to meet with my first Apostle, and your meddling shan't interfere."

It would be only later - much later - that Bill would realize that the cracking noise he could swear he heard in that moment, the sound of something breaking, had come from within his own mind. All he was aware at the moment, as the Sphere's words sank in, was boiling fury, the sort he hadn't felt since he had returned home, that old book in his hands, to find out Liam was _gone_.

_Gone? Is that all you're going to say?_

"What the… is it- IS THAT _IT_?"

The shriek caused the Sphere to hover back, as though taken aback by the sheer force of his voice. Bill's eye stayed fixed on it, on the only thing he could focus on while everything else around him blurred into something distant, a mere backdrop to the object of his anger.

"It is for your own safety that you must leave. Listen to reason. You broke the most basic laws-"

"DON'T GIVE ME THAT ABOUT LAWS! DON'T GIVE ME THAT ABOUT REASON!" Bill howled, and the Sphere backed off again, despite the fact Bill couldn't possibly pose a physical threat to it. "I have moved _mountains_ to be here! People have died or worse so this could happen, and now you won't even _listen_! And here I thought MY kind was limited!"

"Are you so arrogant you have come thinking you could order me-"

"You're going to _fail_ , you pompous pain in the angle," Bill snapped. "Your precious Apostle is going to fail, and the one after that, and the one after _that_! Nothing's gonna change if you don't listen, and you know what? I not going to stay here and watch it happen. Wanna have fun getting _nothing_ done? Fine. But I'm outta here," he added, his voice something akin to a growl, and turned to the still open passage between dimensions. "This dimension can rot, but I refuse to rot with it!"

_There is something out there, something so much bigger than you or I could even imagine. A whole universe of possibilities, and some chosen can even visit it._

"Desist at once!" The Sphere's voice came from behind him, a note of urgency in it. "You are not allowed to move through dimensions! You'll only make it worse for yourself!"

Bill snorted, still marching towards the opening. "Yeah, yeah. Talk to the angle. Ain't you got a doomed Apostle or something to meet? Go do it. See if I care. Meet ya on the other side."

"You fool! You shall see the Third Dimension indeed, but not on your terms. I'll see you taken there a prisoner."

"Oh, yeah? You and what arm-"

"FREEZE!"

Whoever shouted the order didn't give Bill any time to freeze; they didn't even give him enough time to realize what he had just heard, much less to turn and see what hit him. Because something did hit him, sure enough, and with enough force to knock him on the ground, all air escaping him in a wheezing gasp, eye pressed down in the dirt.

"Time Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron! Cease all resistance," someone shouted above him, and of course that only resulted with Bill trying his best to struggle against their grip, against the weight on his back keeping him pinned down, shouting all insults he could think up.

That only made his unseen attackers laugh. "Hah! A Flatlander with an attitude! Never thought I'd see one," one of them said, and Bill felt his arms being yanked back, and something cold closing with a clicking sound around his wrists. "Quit making it worse for yourself, Flattie. You've messed up enough as it is, and- hey, what did you just say about my mother?"

"Just tase him already before anybody hears, will you? Let's get him to Time Baby quickly. I've got a date after our shift."

_Time Baby? What in the Circles is a-_

The crackling of electricity severed any further thought. The jolt caused Bill to convulse hard enough to get one of his attackers partially off him and lift himself; he tried to speak, but all that left him was a sensless, gargling noise. He got one more glimpse of the gateway, so close and yet so far. The colors swirling in it filled his vision, blotting out everything else.

_If you ever get a chance to see what I can only read of, promise me you'll take a good look for both of us. I always wished I could see the colors._

_Make it worth something_.

 _Oh, come on - let me keep one promise, guys. At least one out of two_.

The colors became more intense, almost unbearably so, and Bill was forced to shut his eye.

Or maybe he just lost consciousness. Hard to tell which came first.

* * *

 _In vain did the Sphere, in his voice of thunder, reiterate his command of silence, and threaten me with the direst penalties if I persisted. Nothing could stem the flood of my ecstatic aspirations. Perhaps I was to blame; but indeed I was intoxicated with the recent draughts of Truth to which he himself had introduced me. However, the end was not long in coming._ _  
_ _My words were cut short by a crash outside, and a simultaneous crash inside me, which impelled me through space with a velocity that precluded speech. Down! down! down! I was rapidly descending; and I knew that return to Flatland was my doom. One glimpse, one last and never-to-be-forgotten glimpse I had of that dull level wilderness-which was now to become my Universe again-spread out before my eye. Then a darkness._


	8. Infinetentiary

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was so, _so_ tempted to pull an April's Fool prank instead of posting this. But no worries, I decided not to. Pranking my COO was enough for the day.  
>  (I am going to get fired one of these days)

_At first, indeed, I pretended that I was describing the imaginary experiences of a fictitious person; but my enthusiasm soon forced me to throw off all disguise, and finally, in a fervent peroration, I exhorted all my hearers to divest themselves of prejudice and to become believers in the Third Dimension._ _  
_ _Need I say that I was at once arrested and taken before the Council?_

* * *

Regaining consciousness felt a lot like trying to wake up from a dream you’re having, except that the dream is in the dream and you’re still sleeping. There were noises, too, but it was hard to tell whether they were coming from his own brain or somewhere outside. Slowly - very slowly, part of his mind still wondering if someone had taken the licence plate of the bulldozer that must have ran him over - Bill began grasping more than noises: he began hearing words.

“... You sure he’s still alive? Can’t even see if he’s breathing.”

“Not sure those like him actually have lungs. Relax. He’s fine.”

“Shouldn’t be still unconscious. We didn’t tase him for _that_ long, did we? How high was the voltage?”

“No more than usual. Flatties are weaklings, that’s all. Look, I think he just twitched.”

“Nnh,” Bill managed. Not what he wanted to say - that would have been something along the lines of ‘everything hurts everywhere’ and ‘just five more minutes’ - but still, close enough. Somewhere above him, there was a laugh.

“Told you he’s fine. Hey, Flattie, time to wake up.”

“What the-- _whoa_!”

The sensation of being lifted wasn’t pleasant in itself, but being lifted by the chain between his cuffed wrists was even worse. Bill’s eye snapped open and he was about to protest, but the sudden, unbearable whiteness that assaulted his vision caused him to yelp instead. His world had always been mostly white, with some black and grays thrown in, but nothing before had been so bright. It made his eye hurt almost as much as it had when he had first seen colors.

“Where am I?” he gritted out.

“Third dimension, year 197̃012. And you’re bowtie-deep in trouble, Flattie.”

Wait. The Third Dimension? Had he really made it there?

Bill forced himself to crack his eye open again. For a moment, all he could see was whiteness; it was as though he was suspended into nothingness. Then he was able to put something into focus - the two figures standing before him, one of them effortlessly holding him up at arm’s length - and for a moment he forgot how to speak.

He had seen the Sphere; he knew, thanks to his readings, that more figures made of layers of two-dimensional figures could be found - Cubes and Pyramids and Cones and who knew what else. That was what he had expected: three dimensional geometric figures. The beings he was looking at now, clad in green and gray, were… were...

“... What in the Circles _are_ you?”

“We’re part of the Time Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron,” the one holding him up said haughtily. “Also known as--”

“You have _color_ ? And what’s your shape even _called_?”

“... Time Police, and our mission… what?”

“He’s _pear_ shaped,” his companion said with a snicker, earning himself a glare, but Bill wasn’t listening: he could only stare. They had two eyes? What do you even do with _two_ eyes? And a separate mouth, and… what was that _thing_ in the middle of the sort-of-spherical pink _thing_ on top of some sort of stick? Why did it have two holes? What was the yellow fluff growing on top of it, and those handles on the sides, and--?

“We’re humans, Flattie. If it’s Spheres and stuff you’re looking for, they’re in an entirely different galaxy. What, did you think all dimensions are as small as that hole your world is? We-- er. Okay, now this is getting weird. Quit trying to look up my nose.”

“What’s in there?”

“Empty space,” the other being - _human_ , was that it? - quipped. The one holding Bill up snorted.

“Oh, ha ha. Why don’t you go make yourself useful and tell Time Baby that the Flattie is awake and ready for judgment? I was serious when I told you I’ve got a date after this shift. _Pear-shaped_ or not,” he added.

The other rolled his eyes - why _two_ eyes? - and reached to touch something on his… that was a wrist, right? Had to be. Why were their arms and just plain everything else about them so freakishly _big_? Bill stood a full eleven inches, and the tallest guy he had met until then stood little over twelve; these humans dwarfed by far even the Sphere, who had been at least fifteen inches tall.

“Are all of you humans this big?” Bill blurted out. In his wonder, he had pretty much forgotten all about his predicament; had it not been keeping him from reaching out and trying to grab the guy’s weird appendages, he would have probably forgotten he was even handcuffed and suspended in the air.

The human snorted. “You have yet to see _big_. Unfortunately for you, Flattie, you’re about to meet him.”

Bill frowned, some annoyance leaking in through the sense of wonder. He kicked his dangling legs, knowing it was useless - the guy was holding him too far for him to reach anything, much less his body.  “Meet who? And quit calling me that! I’ve got a name, you kno--”

“WILLIAM NORMAN CIPHER.”

… Okay, now _that_ was taking it just a bit too far. Bill would have protested, hadn’t he been a little too distracted by a few other things.

First of all, the human dropped him, and the meeting with the floor wasn’t fun. Then, as soon as he managed to lift himself up on his knees, his hands still cuffed, he realized that the floor of… whatever that endless whiteness _was_ had opened, and something was emerging, much like the Sphere had back in his dimension. Something a lot bigger than anything he had ever seen until then.

And it did not look friendly, if the pair of red eyes fixed on him were anything to do by.

 _Okay, okay. Play it cool, Cipher. Play it cool. Don’t make them mad_.

“I prefer Bill,” he said. The frown on the being’s face deepened.

_Can’t start this over, can I?_

“YOU ARE WANTED BY ALL IN YOUR DIMENSION. YOU VIOLATED THE LAWS OF SPACE AND TIME. YOU VERY NEARLY CAUSED A TIME PARADOX. HOW DO YOU PLEAD?”

“Huh. Well, the matter is actually kinda complicated, but I was just trying--”

“SILENCE!”

“What? But you _literally_ just asked--”

“MAKE IT QUICK - I HAD TO INTERRUPT MY BEAUTY NAP TO COME JUDGE YOU AND THAT MAKES ME CRANKY.”

“Well, don’t think it was working anyway, so--”

The sound that followed was something that seemed both a wail and a roar, just a billion times louder, and then by blinding light. Bill shut his eye with a yelp, holding up his cuffed arms to shield it, and felt himself being lifted up. When he dared peer through his fingers he realized he was almost at the same eye level, sustained by some sort of light ray coming from that… thing’s forehead. It was even uglier seen up close and really, which eye was he _supposed_ to look into?

“CIPHER!” the being - Time Baby, wasn’t it how they had called him? Didn’t really look like a baby, but then again he looked like nothing he had seen before - boomed, lifting his arms. “YOU ARE GUILTY OF DISRUPTING THE FLOW OF TIME. DO YOU DENY IT?”

“No, but look, if you just let me explain--”

“AND YOU ARE ALSO GUILTY OF INTERRUPTING MY NAP!”

“... Seriously?”

“FOR THE DISRUPTION OF THE TIME FLOW AND OF MY NAP, TWO OF THE WORST CRIMES UNDER MY RULE, I SENTENCE YOU TO TWENTY SQUARED LIFE SENTENCES IN THE INFINETENTIARY. THE COURT IS ADJOURNED.”

Bill blinked. “Wait, what? What court? There is no court here! This wasn’t even a trial, you dumb ba-- hey!” Bill trailed off with a yelp when he realized that the ray was gone, and nothing was keeping him up in the air anymore.

The whiteness rushed up to meet him, and then turned black.

* * *

_“You hear your fate," said the Sphere to me, while the Council was passing for the third time the formal resolution. "Death or imprisonment awaits the Apostle of the Gospel of Three Dimensions."_

* * *

As it turned out, the Infinetentiary was a prison. Big bleedin’ surprise.

That may not have worried Bill too much, because prison was better than death and escaping it still a possibility. What _did_ worry him was noticing, as he was carried to his cell - still kind of dizzy from the fall, but at least awake and aware - that each and every other prisoner he could see was far, far bigger than himself. Most of them looked a lot like the ones who called themselves the Time Police, though he noticed several beings that were… something else, though he wasn’t totally sure _what_ they were.

So he was in prison, surrounded by beings a lot bigger and stronger than himself, his form and lack of color form making him stick out like a sore thumb. That wasn’t exactly how he had planned his visit to the Third Dimension to end up.

“Look, you’re making a mistake,” Bill tried again, attempting to break free from a guard’s grasp. Not that it was of any use, since his feet weren’t even touching the ground and the guy seemed not to notice at all. “C’mon, guys? Chums? If you just give me the time to explain--”

“Negative. Time is not to be wasted on criminals,” the guard cut him off, reaching the entrance of one of the cells. It was mostly dark, but through the transparent screen at the door Bill could barely make out something glowing in it, like low-burning fire.

“No tricks and _no eating your cell mate_ , scum, or you’ll be sorry we didn’t disintegrate you when we could,” a second guard warned, then he gave some sort of vocal order, and he buzzing electric fence that had been blocked the door disappeared. The guard who had been holding Bill uncerimoniously threw him in.

“HEY!” Bill yelped as he landed on the cold metal floor, eye down. That was happening aggravatingly often, lately. “Seriously, guys? What in the--”

“OMIGOSH, LOOK AT YOU! SO TINY!”

The screech was so loud it very nearly put Time Baby’s voice to shame, and twice as grating, but Bill didn’t even have the time to register as much: the next moment someone was grabbing him - again - and lifting him up - again - so he would find himself staring at something he had never seen before - _again_.

At least he couldn’t complain he was having a dull day.

The thing staring at him looked somewhat similar to the humans he had met, with the same overall shape and odd fluff on top of her head, except that she seemed to be a much brighter pink than those he had seen, with a much bigger mouth that was now open in a grin, showing huge mismatched teeth. She also had some huge appendages on her head the humans lacked, and she only had one eye. Bill could have appreciated that last detail, if anything because he didn’t need to try figuring out which eye he should look at, but there was another thing he noticed and that worried him more than a little.

“... Hey, lady. Are you aware you’re on fire?”

That resulted with her giving a howling laugh. “Aww, what  charmer! Shame I heard that so many times, sugar! You’ll need to think up a better one!”

_Wait._

“No, I mean… you’re _literally_ on fire,” Bill said, looking at the white flames rippling over her arms and legs. How come her touch wasn’t burning him, come to think of it?

She seemed to completely ignore his remark, and gave him a wide grin. “You’re so cute I could eat you whole!” she announced, and opened her maw. What the...?

"Wait! _Wait!_ I taste horrible!"

“Hey!” A voice came from outside. “What did I just say? No eating your cell mate! Don’t make me use the taser!”

Her mouth closed with a snap, and she gave him a look that might have been somewhat apologetical. “Oh, sorry! I got carried away! You’re just so adorable, I could squish--”

“How 'bout you put me down instead?” Bill was quick to suggest, knowing that she probably _could_ proceed to do just that, possibly with fatal consequences. Still, for the first time that day, he found he was more curious than frustrated, or furious, or worried, or just plain terrified. She was the first friendly person he had met since leaving his dimension behind, that was for sure. Attempt at eating him and all.

“Oh, sure,” she said, and dropped him on the lower bunk of a bunk bed at the far end of the room. A softer landing the others, at least.

From outside, came the guard’s gruff voice. “Good. Behave, both of you,” he said, and left without another word, but both of them just ignored him. She sat next to him, making the mattress’ springs groan, and grinned again.

“Sorry ‘bout that. Name’s Pyronica.”

“Bill Cipher,” Bill said, reaching up to tip his hat out of habit, but of course it was gone: he must have lost it when the Time Police had tackled him. He settled for straightening his bowtie. “At your service.”

“Aww, a gentleman! So, where are you from? You’re a weirdo, if I say so myself!”

_I like this one. He’s weird!_

_Perhaps it wouldn't be too crazy to think you might take it a few steps further. You're weird enough to do it - Irregular as I am, just as unfit for this world, but they can't see it. An undercover Irregular, if you will. It is a good cover you have. Don't shed it._

Except that he had shed it, and it had turned out not to be such a great idea. Ah well. Since the mask was down, he figured he may as well embrace it.

“I get that a lot,” Bill finally said. “Second Dimension. Nothing very interesting about it,” he added. Even thinking about his homeworld made something in him boil in anger and bitterness, and he’d rather leave it at that. Best not to think of how, if only he had known what awaited, he would have let the Circles have the coordinates and go on with their plan. They would be in that place now instead of him, never to return to their world. But how could he know? How could _anyone_ know?

_Make it worth something._

_Tough luck there, Nora. Sucks to be both of us._

“Where are _you_ from?” he asked, chasing the thought from his mind. “Never seen any other dimensions before I landed in this one, and Time Baby didn’t really let me look around before throwing me in here.”

“Oh, I’m from Dimension 47! Not a bad place, though it’s kinda boring. Or at least it was last time I was there - got kicked out. I tried to shake things up, but people there are so _touchy_ !” Pyronica huffed, throwing her arms up. “Lots of touchy people everywhere, really. Eat a crown and a couple of world leaders, and everyone ruffles their feathers. It was either leaving or going to prison, anyway. Got some trouble in Dimension 35, too, and in Dimension 19, though that wasn’t really my fault. Sort of. Maybe only twenty percent? And I was _totally_ innocent in Dimension 33. Anyway, moving through dimensions without permission wasn’t really legal, but they never caught me until I was dumb enough to mess with time and… wasn’t your pupil _a lot_ smaller a moment ago?” she asked, then turned smug. "What is it? See something you like, or did you sniff up some _soma_?"

He didn’t pay any attention to her remark - what was _soma_ anyway? - and just stared. His disgust for his own dimension and disappointment over this new one were entirely forgotten. “Just _how many_ dimensions are there?” Bill asked, eye wide. There had been speculation, of course, that there could be even more dimensions past the Third one - but to know it for a fact, and to know there were _so many_ more, was something he had been unprepared for.

 _There is something out there, something so much bigger than you or I could even imagine. A whole universe of possibilities, and some chosen can even visit it_.

Unaware of his thoughts, Pyronica reached up to scratch one of her horns. “I know of 69. May be more, though. There are some no one was able to even get in touch with, and--”

“Tell me about the ones you’ve seen,” Bill cut her off. She laughed.

“Sure thing, cutie. Anything in particular you wanna know?”

Bill leaned forward. “Everything. I want to know _everything_ ,” he said. As long as he knew there was more out there, as long as he could _learn_ more, being in a prison didn’t really matter. It was a setback, sure, but nothing more. He had escaped one dimension, and he could do it again.

It was only a matter of _time_.

* * *

_I must be sentenced to perpetual imprisonment; but if the Truth intended that I should emerge from prison and evangelize the world, the Truth might be trusted to bring that result to pass._

* * *

For the next several days, Pyronica did little other than talking and Bill did little other than listening. When not listening, he was asking questions.

“So, Time Baby took over this planet after being frozen in… how do you call that again?”

“Antarctic. I think. Someplace that got melted a long time ago, anyway. I heard this planet used to different before that happened, but it may be just stories. Have I mentioned how freaky it is that your eye is also a mouth? That, and how you’re black and white.”

“Eighteen times,” Bill said after gulping down some of the… whatever that food was. Slop was a way to describe it. “Well, explains why he doesn’t look like the humans do. And this planet is one of eight around a single star? And that is where light comes from?”

“Seven. There was a bit of an accident with Venus. They call it Solar System, but there are lots of others, and lots of galaxies made of them. Bet the Sphere you told me about lives in one of those. This is by far the biggest of all dimension. Sucks that we’re stuck here, ‘cause it would be fun to explore.”

Tell me about it, Bill thought, letting his gaze wander around the huge, gray room where they had their meals. The other prisoners looked less than reassuring, but there were plenty of empty chairs around him and Pyronica: they seemed to fear her, and as a consequence they also steered clear of _him_. Kind of reassuring, that. Most of them looked like they could give him a hard time, especially guys like… wait, where those two ugly mugs coming straight at them?

“GUYS!” Pyronica shrilled, causing Bill to recoil and very nearly spill the slop all over his bowtie. “You’re out of isolation! That lasted _forever_! Come over here!”

The ugly mugs in question grunted, and wasted no time in sitting next to them. One of them was a large green… thing, with chains linking his wrists and ankles together, and eyes that were nothing but black spheres with what looked much like an 8 where his pupils should have been. The other was much smaller - actually not that much bigger than Bill - but the glowing red eyes and horns didn’t make him look much more reassuring than his companion.

Had he not been focused on them, Bill would have noticed most other prisoners at their same table had shifted slightly away. Pyronica, on the other hand, seemed elated. “Guys, this is Bill Cipher, straight from the Second Dimension. Bill, these are my buddies 8 Ball and Paci-Fire - straight from solitary confinement!”

8 Ball turned his huge head to him and grunted in greeting. Paci-Fire, on the other hand, glared at him.

“I have slaughtered millions on thousands moons,” he announced.

Bill blinked. "That's... nice?"

“That’s his way to say hi,” Pyronica helpfully supplied. “I think he likes you.”

Paci-Fire leaned over Bill. “Millions,” he repeated, his voice a growl. Okay, Bill thought, now he was just showing off.

“And what were they? Mosquitoes?”

That caused Pyronica to laugh, and 8 Ball to… well, that did sound kinda like a laugh, too. Paci-Fire’s scowl deepened.

“Want me to show you, little guy?”

“Says the guy with a pacifier. _I_ grew out of that a couple of decades ago.”

“Not scaring him so easily, Paci,” Pyronica warned with a grin. “This one’s tough. He talked back to Time Baby!”

The frown melted away into an expression of pure surprise. Paci-Fire reared back slightly. “You did? And you’re still alive?”

Bill lifted his hands. “That, or you’re seeing a ghost.”

There was a guwaffing laugh. “Hah! Not bad for a Flattie,” Paci-Fire conceded, sitting back. “Teeth n’ Keyhole won’t be out of solitary until next week,” he told Pyronica. “Keyhole stole a set of keys and Teeth almost bit a guard's hand off when he tried to take it back. Guess we can do without them, though. Had your official introduction yet, Bill?”

“Huh?”

“A prison brawl!” Pyronica exclaimed, eye brightening. “I was waiting for you guys to be back - some backup never hurts, right?”

“Ain't one of us until you start a prison brawl,” 8 Ball grunted, pushing his bowl of slop towards Bill. “Got the guts to do it?”

Of course, it was a stupid idea. Bill was much smaller than anyone else in there. Starting a prison brawl was by far the dumbest, most _unreasonable_ thing he could possibly do.  

So, why the heck not?

“PRISON BRAWL!”

It was kinda funny, really, how yelling that and throwing a bowl of slop on one of the guards had been enough to make the whole place descend into chaos. And, of course, the _chaos_ part was even funnier.

Through the cacophony of shouts, roars, crashes and screams, almost no one heard Bill’s laughter in the midst of it all.

“I HAVE FOUND MY PEOPLE!”

* * *

_Prometheus up in Spaceland was bound for bringing down fire for mortals, but I--poor Flatland Prometheus--lie here in prison for bringing down nothing to my countrymen. Yet I exist in the hope that these memoirs, in some manner, I know not how, may find their way to the minds of humanity in Some Dimension, and may stir up a race of rebels who shall refuse to be confined to limited Dimensionality._


	9. Interlude: Chess

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This was supposed to be a flashback in the next chapter, but it would have made the chapter too long compared to the others, and it didn’t quite fit in anyway. Here it is as an interlude - will post the next chapter on Friday as usual!

_When I saw my poor brother led away to imprisonment, I attempted to leap down into the Council Chamber, desiring to intercede on his behalf, or at least bid him farewell. But I found that I had no motion of my own. I absolutely depended on the volition of my Guide, who said in gloomy tones, "Heed not thy brother; haply thou shalt have ample time hereafter to condole with him. Follow me."_

* * *

“Bill! You cheated again!”

“Did not!”

“I saw you! Spit out my King!”

“Can’t. I swallowed.”

“For Circles’ _sake_ , Bill! What’s wrong with you?”

Bill just laughs, so hard that he ends up flat on his back, feet kicking over the chessboard. He hears vaguely, over his own laughter, that Liam is sighing and starting to pick up the chess pieces. “I’ll need to replace that. Thanks a lot, Bill. Dad won’t be happy.”

“Dad’s never happy anyway.”

“Well, _I_ would be if you just stopped being such a pain in the angle. You asked me to teach you how to play chess. You’re never going to learn at this rate.”

“But I did!” Bill protests, sitting back up. “I won. Ate your King. Checkmate!”

For all his frustration, Liam can’t hold back a chuckle. He never stays mad at him for long. “The King can’t be eaten, and even then it wouldn’t be by sticking it in your mouth, Billy. You need a strategy, and to calculate--”

“My way’s quicker,” Bill quips.

“Your way is cheating.”

“Still won!”

“If you cheat, it doesn’t count.”

“Says who?” Bill challenges, and Liam just sighs.

“Alright. Let’s pretend for a moment you’re playing against someone who’s less of a saint than I am and _will_ bash your angle in if you try to _literally_ eat their chess pieces or cheat in any way. Don’t you want to know how to beat them anyway?”

“I’d do it while they’re not looking,” is the predictable reply, but truth be told Bill does want to learn how to play chess, and eventually settles down to listen. He listens, tries to remember the rules and moves, and tries to play again.

He loses. He loses _a lot_ \- and, at first, very quickly. Then, little by little, he learns to avoid his beginner’s mistakes. He learns how to best respond to Liam’s moves, how to put up a fight, make it harder for Liam to get to his King - which is, of course, a circle on the chessboard - and make the games last longer. He still finds ways to cheat, but he makes them less obvious, and in the end Liam almost never realizes it.

It never wins him a game, not against his brother: when Liam is taken, not long after that day, he is still unbeaten.

Bill would get to brag over countless wins in the eons to follow, over the greatest of minds and with no need to cheat - but that one win, the one he wouldn’t get to brag about, would remain in the back of his mind each and every time he’d set his eye on a chessboard for a long, long time to come.

Until the day the all-seeing being would simply forget what losing even feels like.

* * *

_I felt a shooting pain in my inside, and a demoniacal laugh seemed to issue from within me. A moment afterwards the sharp agony had ceased, leaving nothing but a dull ache behind._


	10. Globnar

“Aaand checkmate. There you go. Pay up, guys.”

Bill's victory was greeted by cheers and groans more or less in equal measure. His opponent roared and smashed the chess board - along with the table it had been on - but Bill didn’t so much blink. He just leaned back on his seat and, while 8 Ball went to collect the bets, he held out his hand.

“First prize here, thanks.”

For the outside word, the first prize of a chess tournament in prison would probably be nothing to write home about; but, when prison wine decanted in questionable ways in questionable places is all you get as a drink, a bottle of good stuff smuggled in in unclear ways is worth more than anything.

The loser - a human prisoner, and a hunk of muscle that easily surpassed most guards - glared at him. It had to be nagging him to death, how he couldn’t lift a finger on him despite the fact a finger was all he would need to crush him. Still, an attempt at doing so would have resulted with Pyronica, 8 Ball, Keyhole, Paci-Fire and Teeth being on him in less than a second, and they all hit where it hurt. He wasn’t stupid enough to risk it - or was too boring to do it, depending on how one looked at it.

Just being their friend gave Bill a sort of immunity, and he liked that. It was the best thing about the small gang he had found himself in: they protected their own, which was a lot more than could be said for… most people back home, really.

_You let them take Liam away!_

_We need to be reasonable, Bill._

_Someone must have told them. Someone must have spoken_.

“Where did you even learn to do that?” Keyhole had asked once, after a number of chess tournaments he had won - never having lost any from the first one he had taken part to, which had earned them no small amounts of the goods that counted as money in a place like that.

“Learned from the best mind in my dimension,” Bill had said, and left it at that.

None of the others had asked again, preferring to focus on what his victory had gotten them - like they were doing now, seated in the canteen and mostly ignoring their dinner.

“This is really good stuff,” Pyronica was saying with a grin, holding the bottle up against the light. “Should keep it for a good occasion.”

“How ‘bout next time one of us lands in Solitary?” Teeth said, and there was some laughing over that, most eyes turning to 8 Ball - who was the one to spend the most time there out of all of them.

“Oh, ha ha,” he grunted, still counting the bets they had collected - beans of a thing called ‘coffee’ Bill found he really liked, some magazines, a small radio, a couple of magazines, a deck of cards and so on. “Wanna bet Teeth’s getting himself there first?”

“My money’s on Pyronica,” Paci-Fire said, and they waited for her to retort - except that someone else spoke, and it wasn’t anyone from their group.

“Well, look at that. Second Dimension?”

Teeth, who had been showing off by shoving the whole tray in his mouth - well, all of him was a mouth, really, so that wasn’t saying much - winced and began choking on it. There were some laughs, though Keyhole’s stopped quickly enough when Teeth barfed everything up on him, but Bill paid no attention to any of it. He turned, and for a moment he thought his eye had to be playing tricks on him.

The guy standing before him was an Hexagon, bright red, with orange lips and a mustache. He was holding the tray with his meal in his hands, looking straight at Bill. Well, so to speak: with no visible eye, it was hard to tell whether or not he had means to _look_. But he was sorta facing him and clearly recognized him as a two-dimensional being, so he had to be able to see somehow.

Besides, Bill had more pressing questions to ask.

“Guilty as charged. Are _you_?”

“Nope,” the guy said, and turned just enough to let Bill realize that he was much thicker than him, so definitely not from the Second Dimension. Maybe the fact he had colors should have been a big enough hint, come to think of it. And there was only one world Bill had heard of what was inhabited by three-dimensional geometrical shapes.

“... Hey, new guy. You don’t happen to be from the same homeworld as Spheres, do you?”

The mouth curled in a grin. “My turn to admit guilt. Name’s Hectorgon,” he said, holding out one hand, which Bill reached out to shake. He instinctively liked the guy, if anything because he’d had the guts to approach. Kinda ballsy, that: most prisoners, even the most seasoned ones, steered clear of them; let alone newcomers who were hardly bigger in size than Bill himself.

All things considered, he had been pretty lucky by getting on Pyronica’s good side right off the bat.

“Bill Cipher. I happen to be thanks to a Sphere to begin with, really. Know the guy? Or are there many of those in your world?”

“Several. Not many compared to the rest of us, anyway. They’re pretty much the elite guys.”

Like the Circles, then. Bill couldn’t say he was surprised. “We got one who came over every thousand years, or claimed he did.”

Hectorgon let out a hum. “Impossible. None of us lives that long - I don’t think our life span is much longer than yours. It’s got to be a different guy each time, but I guess pretending to be the same one makes them look better. Like actual gods or something, except that they’re not. Bunch of jerks.”

That, too, wasn’t anything Bill hadn’t half-expected. “Sounds a lot like the Circles, alright. Could have been the same one, though, if he used time travel.”

That caused Hectorgon to laugh. “Really, now? Haven’t seen where that has landed us? Those guys can travel through dimensions, very rarely, but never through time. They may be hot stuff in our world, but to Time Baby--”

“I _love_ your mustache!” Pyronica suddenly shrilled, leaning over the table and knocking off a few more trays in the process. It looked like watching Teeth choking had lost its appeal. “I want one just like that!”

Hectorgon grinned, and reached to smooth it, the tray in precarious balance on his other hand. “Why, thank you, ma’am. I love your hair, too.”

“Aww, a gentleman! That’s so cute I could eat yo--”

“Don’t,” Bill was quick to cut her off. “That’s gonna land you in Solitary. Don’t wanna let Paci win the bet, do ya?”

“Hey! Not fair if you stop her!” Paci-Fire protested, then he seemed to notice Hectorgon for the first time, and immediately scowled. “I have slaughtered millions of hundreds moons,” he announced to his benefit.

“Wasn’t it thousands just last time?” Bill quipped, causing Paci-Fire to scowl.

“Are you up to ruin everything for me today?”

“He ruins everything for everyone all the time,” Pyronica pointed out, and held out her fist. Bill bumped it with his own.

“What Ronnie said,” he muttered, and turned back to Hectorgon. “How ‘bout you sit down? The guys don’t usually bite. Except Teeth ‘cause, well, what else would he do?”

Hectorgon took the invitation right away, sitting next to 8 Ball with no hint of worry. “Good evening, everyone,” he said, and looked straight ahead. “I assume you’re Teeth?”

“Hey! How’d you guess?”

“How do you _think_ he guessed, dumbass?” Bill muttered, rolling his eye. “Yeah, that’s him. These are Pyronica,  Paci-Fire--”

“I have slaughtered millions--”

“Shut it. This is 8 Ball, and that’s Keyhole right over there. Say, what are _you_ in for?”

“Yeah, is having awesome mustache a crime where you’re from or what?”

Hectorgon shrugged, putting down his tray. “I tried to travel back in time to the beginning of my species and use my future knowledge to make Spheres pariah as opposed to the jerks they are. Sadly, the Time Police was on me right away. I had no idea they even existed until that moment,” he said.

“Yeah, they tend to ruin everything,” Pyronica muttered. “Them and their stupid rules. Hey, no, don’t eat that!” she exclaimed, holding up a hand to keep Hectorgon from taking a spoonful of his slop. He seemed taken aback.

“Why not? Is it poisonous?”

“Probably, but that’s not the point,” Bill said. “Not one of us until you start a prison brawl. Just grab it and throw it at a guard - it’s got to be a guard or someone _big_.”

“Yeah, throw it at that ugly mug over there!”

Hectorgon hesitated. “To be honest, I am rather hungry and--”

“Aw, c’mon!” Pyronica urged him, and hit the table. “I know what you need to do it! Have a drink first!” She exclaimed, placing the bottle Bill had won at the chess tournament the previous day on the table. Bill had never really asked where exactly she kept stuff hidden under her prison uniform, but she could stuff a lot of things there somehow. “Gotta celebrate a new member, right?”

“Right!”

“Good idea!”

The bottle was opened, and to be fair it was good stuff. Strong, too. Probably a bit _too_ strong, and Bill… well, he was kind of a lightweight, so maybe he should have been more careful.

He would remember how much noise they were making, and he would remember a grim-looking guard approaching their table with a taser to threaten them into silence. He would remember, vaguely, standing up on the table to snap back at him. He would remember nothing of what happened next, though he would hear pretty wild accounts later on.

The only thing Bill Cipher would know once he regained consciousness was that he had apparently started a full-blown prison riot through the sheer power of rambling, and everyone was absolutely certain he had done it on purpose.

He never tried to correct them on that. Would have been kinda embarrassing, admitting he was just blind drunk.

* * *

_Surprised, leader-less, attacked in front by invisible foes, and finding egress cut off by the Convicts behind them, they at once--after their manner--lost all presence of mind, and raised the cry of "treachery."_ _  
_ _This sealed their fate._

* * *

“This is so much fun!”

“A lot better than the usual brawl!”

“We got all the guards locked up, except a few who escaped!”

“Who wants to go poke them with electric sticks!”

“Me! Me!”

“Best day of my life!”

“Hey, look! That’s him!”

“That was great, Bill!”

“Yeah, you told it how it is!”

A couple thousand eyes turned to him the moment he walked in the common room. Everything around him still wavering a bit - it had stopped spinning, at least - Bill blinked.

_Okay, okay. Play it cool, Cipher. Act like you know what in the Circles is going on. Don’t topple over. Don’t throw up._

“... Hey,” he said, waving. The reaction was an uproar.

“BILL! BILL! BILL! BILL!”

Well, wow. Bill still wasn’t entirely sure what he had done or said to cause all that, but he wasn’t gonna complain. That was _fun_. And, considering how Time Baby was probably not going to leave the Infinetentiary in their hands for much longer, it was probably best to enjoy it before being turned into a pile of smoking ashes.

… Come to think of it, Bill wasn’t looking forward to being turned into ash. Maybe it would be best to call for a very quick meeting while everyone else was busy poking guards with sticks, after all.

* * *

_Then the wretched rabble of the Isosceles, planless and leaderless, are either transfixed without resistance by the small body of their brethren whom the Chief Circle keeps in pay for emergencies of this kind; or else more often, by means of jealousies and suspicious skillfully fomented among them by the Circular party, they are stirred to mutual warfare, and perish by one another's angles._

* * *

“We could try to escape before that happens.”

“Those who tried to get out were already destroyed. This place is ours, but we can’t leave it.”

“Kinda like a siege. No chance of breaking it, though. And how long before food runs out? Wonder who’s gonna be eaten first.”

“Hey now, don’t be so negative!”

“He’s right. Bet the only reason why Time Baby’s not here already to turn us into jam is that there are still guards alive in here.”

“Don’t think it’s gonna keep him away for long. Don’t have him pegged as the sentimental guy.”

“Yeah. He’ll turn them into mush as well the moment he decides he wants to get back to his nap.”

“So, in short, we’re dead meat.”

“Heh. ‘Twas fun, though. Even if we’re gonna die for it and stuff.”

“So, Bill, what do you think?”

Bill, who had been following the conversation with a deepening scowl, snorted. “All I can think right now is that I’ll set this place on fire and burn with it before I let that dumb baby do me in.”   

Pyronica laughed and lit up her hand. “I can do that. We’d go out with a bang!”

“Turn that thing off! I don’t want to die! I have more millions to slaughter on more moons!”

“... How about we invoke Globnar?” Hectorgon spoke up for the first time in a few minutes, and seemed surprised by the blank looks that got him. “Globnar, guys. _Globnar_. Haven’t you… oh, wait. You’ve been in here for a while, huh? It was reinstated only recently. The Time Police was talking about it when they were taking me to Time Baby.”

A few glances were exchanged, then a few shrugs that clearly spelled ‘no better plan anyway’. Bill turned back to Hectorgon.

“Okay, I’ll bite. What’s Globnar?”

Hectorgon spoke quietly, but hearing him was not a problem: as they grouped around him, everyone was unusually silent. Even the faint crackling noise of Pyronica’s flames could be easily heard.

“It’s a sort of gladiatorial time combat. From what I gathered, anyone who feels they have been wronged can invoke it and name the person - or people - they want to face in combat. There are several trials to win, if I got that right, and those with the most points win. The winner can decide the fate of any losers, and receives a Time Wish.”

“... A what?”

“Oooh! I heard of that!” Keyhole exclaimed, reaching to pull at Bill’s arm. “A Time Wish allows you to wish for anything - anything at all! And with no risk of time paradoxes!”

Anything _at all_ ? Now that was interesting. _Very_ interesting.

“What are the trials like?” Pyronica asked, to which Hectorgon lifted his hands.

“I don’t know the details, I’m afraid. Dangerous ones, I assume, but if Time Baby flattening us along with the others in here is the only other option,” he paused, not really needing to go on.

“Then we may as well take the chance,” Bill heard himself saying, and laughed. “Guys? I think we’ve got our ticket out of here. Here’s how we’re gonna handle this...”

* * *

_In half an hour not one of that vast multitude was living; and the fragments of seven score thousand of the Criminal Class slain by one another's angles attested the triumph of Order._

* * *

“You invoke _what_?”

The look of surprise on the guard’s face - one of the few guards who had a face left, anyway - was so funny Bill couldn’t help but laugh. It was Paci-Fire to answer on his behalf.

“You heard him just right,” he grunted.

“That’s folly!”

“Just our thing, then,” Bill muttered, and pushed the radio communicator in his hands. “Get in touch with the Time Police, or Time Baby, or whoever, and tell them just that. Bill Cipher is invoking Globnar. Oh, and them as well,” he added, gesturing towards Paci-Fire and Pyronica.

The guard hesitated, but all that was needed for him to go ahead and do as he had been told to was one look at Pyronica, who had lifted and ignited her hand. He swallowed hard and turned on the communicator. “A-alright. Who are you challenging?”

“Those guys over there,” Bill said with a shrug, gesturing to his left. To their credit 8 Ball, Hactorgon, Keyhole and Teeth were doing a pretty good job at looking the part of the challenged enemies. “Oh, everyone else is on the Eastern wing at the moment, by the way. Card tournament. An easy target. Thought Time Baby would like to know which part of the prison to destroy. He’s welcome. Now _call him_.”

He called, and gave Bill’s message.

Sure enough, the Eastern wing was reduced to dust with everyone in it the next minute. But it didn’t matter, because _they_ were still around, and they had… well, an approximation of a plan, at least.

It wasn’t like Bill had ever tried to claim it was a reasonable plan to begin with.

* * *

_No less than one hundred and twenty rebellions are recorded in our annals, besides minor outbreaks numbered at two hundred and thirty-five; and they have all ended thus._

* * *

“... Well. If we die in here, at least we got to see something _really_ cool.”

Eye fixed on the sheer vastness of the arena, on the seemingly endless sea of spectators waiting to watch them fight, Bill barely heard Pyronica's comment. Better hope they would be able to play the part convincingly enough, because if anyone realized they were only pretending--

“SILENCE!”

The booming voice of Time Baby was familiar as it was unpleasant. He emerged from the ground as he had the previous time, in that white void Bill had first found himself after his arrest. Everyone watching immediately fell, well, silent. Kinda impressive, Bill had to admit, but it made Time Baby one sucky event host. He didn’t even look like he wanted to _be_ there.

… Neither did his friends, by the looks of it.

“What was Plan B again, guys?” Pyronica whispered, cuffed hands held up in front of her. Like that would be of any help if that dumb baby had a tantrum and decided to strike them down.

“ _This_ is Plan B,” Keyhole muttered, his voice sounding much like a whine.

“You mean Plan _Bill_.”

“Bill, _seriously--_ ”

“Don’t burst a blood vessel, guys. We’ll be fine. Don’t you trust me?”

“ _Should_ we?”

Bill thought about it for a moment. “Well, no. But on the bright side-- wait, is it that screen or my eye is really that big?”

His question would get no reply, because the next moment Time Baby lifted his arm, casting a shadow on all of them as they stood in the arena, and spoke again.

“WELCOME, GLOBNAR TRIBUTES. THE LEADERS OF EACH TEAM TAKE A STEP FORWARD NOW.”

There goes nothing, Bill thought, and took a step forward. A few feet from him, 8 Ball did the same. Time Baby’s eyes turned to them, but there was no sign of recognition, even though he had sentenced them both to several square lives sentences each. Then again, they were just a couple of the people he must have thrown in there; what reason would he have to remember them?

 _He’ll have reason to remember me soon. So many reasons_.

“YOU EACH ACCUSE THE OTHERS OF STARTING THE RIOT IN THE INFINETENTIARY. I HAD TO STOP NAPPING AND PULVERIZE HALF OF IT, AND THAT MAKES ME CRANKY.”

Plenty of things do, Bill thought, but for once he knew better than saying as much aloud. Not that holding back the remark didn’t cause him almost physical pain, because it _did_.

“I WOULD ERASE YOU WHERE YOU STAND HAD YOU NOT INVOKED GLOBNAR,” Time Baby went on, eyes narrowed, and this time Bill couldn’t resist.

“But law is _law_ , huh?”

 _Circles, I love irony_.

If gaze could kill, Bill would have dropped dead right there and then. Well, _that_ baby’s gaze could kill, if some tales were to be believed, but he didn’t seem up to use that trick at the moment. And, hopefully, he wouldn’t get a chance to _later_.

“INDEED,” he very nearly growled. “YOUR FATE WILL BE DECIDED THROUGH GLADIATORIAL COMBAT. LET THE GLOBNAR BEGIN!”

The public cheered, loud as thunder. The handcuffs fell off their wrists. 8 Ball roared. Pyronica lit up her hands. Keyhole fainted, causing Bill to roll his eye.

The plan was simple, almost embarrassingly so: they would put up a show, pretending to be really battling - but it was already agreed that Bill’s team would be the winning one, earning themselves their freedom.

“Why Bill?” Teeth had protested, but Pyronica had shut him up quickly enough.

“‘Cause he came up with the plan, Dentures,” she had said before giving Bill a fistbump that had thrown him on the floor.

With that settled, what followed was obvious: when asked what fate he chose for the losers, Bill would choose to free them as well. As for the Time Wish… Bill had plans regarding that, too. But, first, they needed to play their part convincingly.

 _Make it worth something_ , Nora had pleaded in what had been their own world’s third Millennium, Circles knew how long before. In the year 197̃019, Bill laughed.

 _Oh, I will_.

* * *

One of the battles involved spears. 8 Ball very nearly smacked Bill out of shape. His act sure was convincing, but also painful. His team took the point.

* * *

Chess was easy. Bill won it with four moves. Teeth reacted by chewing up the chess board and got a pawn stuck between his molars.

* * *

The hot dog eating competition was even easier. Pyronica grabbed her whole tray with her tongue before Hectorgon even took a bite. A time droid tried to explain her the competition was won, and did not require her to eat the table as well. She ate the droid and then the table. The public loved that.

* * *

The motorcycle race was kind of fun. Especially when Pyronica climbed off it and it turned out she vomited fire, along with charred remains of hot dog, a droid’s arm and a table’s leg.

* * *

Paci-Fire’s attempt at running on the wheel without falling off was kind of a disaster, and the stadium was gonna need a new wall on the north side. Bill didn’t mind the lost point too much. It was just too much fun to watch. Almost as much as watching Keyhole failing so epically at time Jenga that 8 Ball had to dig him out of the rubble.

* * *

The Being Whose Name Must Never Be Said was kind of a mouthful to say, really, so Bill didn’t mind too much Pyronica renaming it Xanthar after defeating it. When she declared they were going to keep it, however, Hectorgon very nearly began crying.

* * *

The ancient game of Laser Tag ended almost as soon as it began, if anything because Pyronica immediately grabbed Bill and threw him towards the sphere they were supposed to get at. Bill didn’t really touch it as much as he slammed against it, before landing painfully on the ground with it.

But it _did_ count as touching it, and with that Globnar was over.

* * *

“IT IS FINISHED!”

The cheering that ensued drowned out even Time Baby’s voice, and members of the Time Police were in the arena before Bill could even blink, surrounding 8 Ball’s team. Time Baby approached as well, hovering lower - which didn’t really change much, considering how much he was compared to Bill’s eleven inches of height. He had to lean forward a lot to watch him up close.

“Before I give you your time wish, tell me - what fate do you choose for the losers?”

“Death!” Came a chanting from the public. “Death! Death! Death! DEATH!”

Bill cast a quick glance at the losers in questions. They were doing a pretty good job at looking terrified, he had to give them that. Either it was great acting, or they didn’t _fully_ trust him not to choose death.

As if he’d rid them of his presence so easily.

“The losers are free and are walking out of here with us,” Bill said, and 8 Ball’s sigh of relief was probably heard across the stadium - immediately followed by a collective sigh of disappointment, and Pyronica’s fake cough. Bill rolled his eye. “Okay, okay. Them, and The Being Whose Name Must Never Be Said. Or Xanthar, whatever. We’re gonna keep that, too.”

“Yay!” Pyronica exclaimed somewhere behind him, throwing up her arms.

On the other hand, Time Baby frowned. “He is not among the losers.”

Bill crossed his arm. “And why not, huh? He was in the arena. We fought him. He lost. Makes him a loser. The law is law, right? He’ll fit right in with the rest of the losers over there,” he added, waving his hand towards the others.

“Hey now--” Hectorgon began, only to be tackled on the ground by Keyhole before he could say _anything_ that may reveal their trick. Probably wouldn’t have made much difference, though, since Time Baby’s attention was fixed on. He didn’t look happy, but he didn’t seem to have a retort, either. When he spoke, it was with a scowl.

“VERY WELL. THEY WILL ALL LEAVE WITH YOU,” he said, and made a gesture with his hand, causing the handcuffs to fall off 8 Ball, Keyhole, Teeth and Hectorgon. Some time droids brought forward a chained Xanthar as well, which didn’t fail to make Pyronica shriek in delight. “NOW, YOUR TIME WISH, SO I CAN RETURN TO MY NAP.”

Bill blinked when he saw the golden, glowing orb descending in front of him. Wait, was the thing he was literally _thrown_ against only minutes earlier the Time Wish? Really? Good thing it hadn’t broken in the landing or something.

The orb hovered before him, painfully bright against his eye, and surprise faded into something else entirely - euphoria and complete, unbridled _triumph_.

_It’s happening! It’s finally, finally happening!_

“ALL YOU NEED TO DO IS TOUCH THE ORB AND THINK OF YOUR WISH. MILLIONS HAVE DIED OVER THE CENTURIES FOR A TIME WISH, SO YOU MUST CHOOSE WISELY--”

With a laugh that sounded unhinged even to him, Bill slammed his hand against the orb. Choose? He had chosen already, had known what he wanted for a long time, so why wait now that it was all within his reach - _literally_ within his reach?

_I want power! I want knowledge! I want it all!_

The orb faded into pulsing, blinding whiteness. Bill kept laughing while he felt himself being lifted in the air, when the light around him began crackling with energy - but his laugh broke off when energy began cracking _within_ him. All of a sudden he was burning, then freezing, then burning again; there was pull, as though every molecule in his body was coming apart and then falling back together in a way that no longer _fit_ , only to be torn apart once more.

The echo of his laugh had barely faded when he began screaming - one single, endless, wordless scream as the world around him went from white to bright red, and then turned black.

Because, as it turned out, the process of turning matter into pure energy is amazingly painful.

* * *

_An unspeakable horror seized me. There was a darkness; then a dizzy, sickening sensation of sight that was not like seeing; I saw a Line that was no Line; Space that was not Space: I was myself, and not myself. When I could find voice, I shrieked loud in agony, "Either this is madness or it is Hell."  
_ _"It is neither,” calmly replied the voice of the Sphere, "it is Knowledge; it is Three Dimensions: open your eye once again and try to look steadily."_

* * *

Bill Cipher opened his eye. He looked.

And he saw _everything_.

* * *

_I looked, and, behold, a new world! There stood before me, visibly incorporate, all that I had before inferred, conjectured, dreamed, of perfect Circular beauty. [...]_ _  
_ _"Behold, I am become as a God. For the wise men in our country say that to see all things, or as they express it,_ omnividence _, is the attribute of God alone."_


	11. Liberation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I may or may not have upped the rating a bit. Just to be on the safe side, since what Bill does to his homeworld is not pretty.

It was like watching a Supernova.

In the long, long time that followed, Pyronica would say just that to anyone asking what it had been like. That one answer only, because to be honest - not something she often was - there was no other comparison she could think of that truly fit.

She had seen a Supernova explosion once, a long time before, from a safe distance. She had been watching when the star’s core had cracked and collapsed, sending a terrifying shock wave to its surface. She had seen the impossibly bright flash that had resulted, so strong she could no longer look. When she had looked again, there was a fine mist scattered across the galaxy - and, at the very center, a small neutron star.

Except that it had all been silent, then, no sound reaching her through the immensity of space. There and then, in the Globnar arena, Bill’s scream drowned out every other noise. Until it stopped abruptly, like someone had hit a switch, and the blinding light faded.

Then, there was a long minute of silence. Bill’s form remained in mid-air, still and quiet, eye closed and limbs hanging limply.  His body glowed white of a light that gave no warmth.

“... Is he dead?” 8 Ball asked, his voice a hoarse whisper.

 _A Supernova is a dying star, after all_.

Pyronica opened her mouth to reply, but she really had no idea what to answer, so instead she glanced at Time Baby - who was staring at Bill as well, looking… wait, why was it just her or he actually seemed _scared_?

“Hey, look!”

“Something’s happening!”

Bill’s body glowed brighter once, then again, and finally the white glow began dulling into something else - a bright yellow that did not fade. There was another moment of stillness and silence, no more than a heartbeat, and Bill’s frame shuddered, his eye snapping open. He stared at them for a moment before looking down at himself, pupil blown wide - then he threw up his arms and laughed.

“Ta-daa! Makeover! Whatddayathink?”

Yellow actually looked kinda cute on him and Pyronica opened her mouth to say as much, but she was cut off by Paci-Fire’s sputtering. “What the-- what? WHAT? You had a Time Wish and you used it for a _makeover_?”

Bill frowned down at him, still hovering in mid-air, and crossed his arms. “Wow, _rude_. I’ll have you know I also asked for immense power and knowledge and am now virtually immortal, but you could at least have said something nice before we got to the finer details. Look what I can do now!” He exclaimed, and snapped his fingers. A party hat appeared on his upper angle.

Keyhole blinked. “... Ah. Er. Nice?”

Bill frowned at their lack of enthusiasm, then glanced up at the party hat. “Oh, wait. Hehe! Still gotta get the hang of it. Okay, how’s this?” He asked, snapping his fingers again. The party hat disappeared to be replaced by a black top hat. “There! Much better. I missed the hat - gotta look good to beat up a baby.”

… Wait, what? What did he just _say_?

She had no time to ask, because the next moment Bill had already turned back to Time Baby. “Hey, big guy! Why is a raven like a writing desk? Huh? Bet you don’t know! I do! Not telling you, but _I_ know! ”

The worried expression that had been on Time Baby’s face turned into confusion. “WHAT?”

Bill laughed and flew - levitated? What was even the right way to describe it? - closer, until they were at the same eye level. “And wait, hear this out! What’s the air-speed velocity of an unladen swallow?”

“YOU’RE SPEAKING NONSEN--”

“It’s less than _this_!”

Bill spread out his arms in a sudden movement, and Time Baby was thrown back as though hit by a violent gust of wind. He let out a cry that sounded much like a wail and crashed against the nearby wall with such force he split it in two, causing the spectators who had been sitting on the tribunes to fall into the chasm. All other onlookers began screaming and trying to run away, trampling each other in the process; at least a couple dozen members of the Time Police seemed to appear out of nowhere, and pointed up their guns. Bill kept laughing, seemingly unaware of their presence.

“And _that’s_ for dropping me flat on my eye!” he called out. “You could have spared a moment to listen to me, but _nooo_ , you had to be all high and mighty! How mighty do you feel now?”

“Bill!” Keyhole tried to warn him just a moment before the men shot. Bill turned, and spread his arms as though to offer a better target; all laser beams hit him, but bounced off, right back at the men who had fired. Pyronica and the others could only stare with wide eyes - at least those of them who had one or more eyes - as a couple dozen top notch officers of the Time Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron fell like a bunch of pins and stayed motionless.

Above them, Bill was still laughing. “Guns! Hahahahaha! That’s so dumb it’s funn--”

“ENOUGH!”

A ray of red light suddenly shot above their heads, powerful enough to drown out all other light, and hit Bill straight on, swallowing him.

He pulverized him, Pyronica thought in sudden panic, he must have, he--

Somewhere above them, Bill laughed again. “Hey guys, get down!”

All six of them - seven, counting Xanthar - were flat on the ground before he was even done speaking. And just on time, too, because the next moment a blue beam passed right over their heads and threw Time Baby right back against the wall, causing him to wail once more. When they looked up Bill was hovering above them, and still laughing. Something that looked like blue fire glowed around both of his hands.

“Wanna know something cool about energy, you dumb baby? _You don’t get to destroy it_!”

Time Baby rose again, eyes glowing red. “HOW _DARE_ YOU!”

“What did you think was gonna happen, Time Idiot?” Bill taunted. “Just giving away a wish like that! It was only a matter of time - heh, get it? A matter of _time_! - before someone was smart enough to cheat their way to it.”

“Bill! Shut the hell up!” Paci-Fire called out, but no avail: Bill was paying no attention to any of them. Neither was Time Baby, whose eyes narrowed.

“CHEAT?”

“Ooooh, the twist!” Bill exclaimed, throwing his hands up. “I cheated! Who would have guessed? Oh, wait, I know the answer - _anyone but you_!” Bill said, pointing his fingers at him like guns and then making a clicking sound. Blue fire shot out of his hands, but Time Baby’s laser eyes overpowered it. Far from looking worried, Bill just dodged the beam.

“YOU HAVE DECEIVED ME! BENT THE GLOBNAR TO YOUR ENDS!” Time Baby thundered, his voice loud enough to shake the earth.

Bill just scoffed. “What did you think, big guy? That I was gonna win it fair and square? The guys and I had already agreed to everything! I take what I want, you dumb baby, like you took this world - and you were stupid enough to hand it all to me!”

The scowl on Time Baby’s face deepened, and his eyes glowed red again - except that, at the very last moment, it wasn’t on Bill that they turned. It was on _them_ \- and, a moment later, two red beams flashed out. Someone shrieked, but it could have been just about anyone - Teeth or Keyhole or even Xanthar. Pyronica didn’t turn to look: she just shut her eye against the painfully red glare, fully expecting it to destroy them all before they could even say ‘pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis’. Well, at least they _did_ get to see something cool before they were incinerated, after all. It could have been worse. For example--

_“Oh no you don’t!”_

A shadow fell over them, and the sound of an explosion followed moments afterwards. She dared to peer up - everyone else still was face down and Teeth was chattering madly, turned to the other side - and all she could see for a moment was a yellow wall looming over them. It took her a moment to realize it was Bill, and that he was suddenly huge enough to have shielded them all from the laser beams.

“This ain’t about them!” Bill snapped, his voice almost unbearably loud, even if nowhere as deep as Time Baby’s. Smoke rose from where he had been struck, but he seemed not to even notice.

“THEY HAVE CHEATED, JUST AS YOU HAVE!”

“ _I_ won your stupid game! _I_ get to choose their fate, and they’re coming with me,” Bill countered, and suddenly another set of arms was appearing from his sides, then another. “No one’s _ever again_ taking anything of mine while I’m not looking! Take on me only, Time Brat, or just step aside and get us back to the Second Dimension. I’ve got a bone to pick with _them_ first!”

For a moment it looked like Time Baby would break into a tantrum and resume the fight, his features so twisted in fury he was hardly recognizable, then his expression slowly changed into something resembling calm.

“VERY WELL. IF THAT IS YOUR CHOICE, RETURN TO YOUR WORLD. RETURN TO YOUR TIME AND TAKE THESE CRIMINALS WITH YOU,” he said.

The hourglass symbol on his forehead glowed blue, and something opened up above their heads: the unmistakable tear in reality that marked a passage between dimensions. Normally, they were swirling with colors - but this one showed only black, white and shades of gray.

Bill laughed. “Finally! Great to see at least one of us can be reasonable - ‘cause I sure can’t!” he exclaimed, and turned to glance at them. “Hop in, guys. There’s a dimension for us to take over and _a lot_ of redecorating to do!”

The idea of a whole dimension for themselves to rule over would have seemed ridiculous only a hour before, but now it felt like something truly possible - _anything_ was possible, with Bill powerful as he was. And if all the inhabitants of his world were weak as he had described them, weak as he used to be… then taking it over would be a child’s play.

8 Ball and Pyronica exchanged a glance. “Well. Didn’t have different plans for the weekend anyway,” she said, a grin already starting to curl her lips. That sounded pretty exciting, she had to admit - more than anything that had ever happened in the Infinetentiary prior to the riot, that was for sure.

“Me neither.”

“We’re free!”

“We’re gonna make the rules!”

“You mean we’re _not_ gonna make rules!”

“Have you got moons where I can slaughter millions?” Paci-Fire was already asking. Bill didn’t turn, eye still on Time Baby in case he tried anything, but laughed.

“No moons, but you’ll get your millions,” he said, and that was the last thing Pyronica heard before the  interdimensional rift’s pull lifted them up - sucking them into a world that would be theirs to undo, and that would become their home for a trillion years to come.

* * *

The portal’s pull was powerful, but not nearly enough to make Bill budge - not even when he shrank back to his usual size. Nothing in the universe - nothing in the _multiverse_ \- could make him go anywhere he didn’t wish to go ever again.

He was all-powerful. He didn’t tire out. He could change his form if so he wished, and take on someone who could have squashed him with a finger not even a hour earlier. He could do _anything_ he wanted - and what he wanted more than anything, right there and then, was giving his dimension one hell of a party. Everything else could and _would_ wait.

Later… well, there were so many places outside his dimension that could use some _partying_ , weren’t there? An infinite amount of possibilities in countless places he had never been to and yet now could _see_. The mere thought made him want to laugh himself through eternity and back.

“Good call, ankle biter,” he said, crossing his arms, and let the rift pull him up as well, staring down at Time Baby the whole time. “It’s gonna give you more _time_ before I come back to turn you into jam as well! See ya real soon!” he called out, and laughed at Time Baby’s stony expression right before the rift closed and he was pulled back into the Second Dimension.

He was not there to hear when Time Baby spoke again.

“IMMENSE KNOWLEDGE, AND YOU ARE STILL A FOOL,” he said, voice echoing through the ruined arena. “YOU HAVE CHOSEN YOUR NEXT PRISON, BILL CIPHER.”

* * *

“Sheesh, _this_ is where you come from?”

“Kinda anticlimactic.”

“No wonder you wanted out.”

“Yeah, told you it was bad. Sucks, doesn’t it?”

8 Ball grunted in agreement, glancing at the gray dullness all around them, without a soul in sight and only a few buildings visible from a distance. It looked even more depressing than Bill remembered, even though nothing had changed.

He knew a lot of things now, and thus he also knew _when_ they were: precisely seven years after his arrest, the same amount of time he had spent in the Infinetentiary. It looked like that dumb brat hadn’t been up to give him back the wasted time, but it didn’t matter. He was immortal now, after all. Seven measly years were less than the blink of an eye.

“Thought you were exaggerating,” Keyhole muttered, causing Bill to cross his arms.

“Hey now! When do I ever do that?”

“Always,” Pyronica immediately said, and she wasn’t the only one.

“Constantly.”

“All the time.”

“Do you want the short list or the long one?”

Bill rolled his eye. “Sheesh, _you’re_ the ones exaggerating now,” he said, but he didn’t mind at all. Of course they exaggerated - that was why they were _his_ people, wasn’t it? He laughed and turned to the dull gray landscape before them. “... Well. I did say this place could use some _redecorating_ , right?”

Using his newfound powers came as natural as moving his arms, or blinking: all he had to do was to will it, and it would happen. Sending a shockwave across his dimension took no more effort than lifting his hands to do so - and suddenly in a flash of blinding light, there was _color_.

It was nowhere as dull as the color in the Infinetentiary or the rest of Time Baby’s boring domain: they were bright and vibrant and _alive_ , the sky swirling with yellows and reds and purple and more colors none of the ten thousand existing dimensions had found words for yet.

_I always wished I could see the colors._

Xanthar roared, clearly taken aback by the sudden change, but the rest of them cheered. Bill kinda liked being cheered at. It was the kind of thing he could get used to.

In the distance there were sounds - sirens and screams - and none of it was surprising. So much color everywhere was enough to cause the unaccustomed eye excruciating pain and everyone was certainly panicking, but Bill was beyond caring. He had been in _prison_ for trying to do something for that rotten corner of the multiverse. Let the _reasonable_ folk of the Second Dimension bear some discomfort as well.

“Much better, dontchathink?”

“This is _awesome_!”

“It looks like home now!” Pyronica exclaimed, clapping her hands.

“It _is_ home,” Bill said, and laughed. “This world is under new management - time to let them all _know_.”

* * *

“What’s going on?”

“What’s happening?”

“My eye! It hurts!”

“Mom! Mom!”

“Oh Circles, what are those??”

“S-stop! In the name of--”

The Isosceles guard’s attempt at stopping them before they reached General Assembly Hall was honestly kind of adorable, Bill had to admit. He might have even admired the courage if only it hadn’t been so amazingly stupid. Look at them, the lowest of the low, facing the end of the world as they knew it and yet trying to protect their oppressors instead of trying to seize the chance or save themselves.

Much like his birth family, they were precisely where they deserved to be. Anything that would happen to them now was something they had brought upon themselves by fighting on the wrong side, or not fighting at all when they should have.

“They’re all yours, guys,” Bill said, and hovered higher up without sparing them another glance. Of course he heard screams and pleas, because even the best-trained of them were simply no match against his friends, but he paid them no heed. Those idiots were doomed, and he had bigger fish to fry. Literally.

_Make it worth it._

_You bet._

The General Assembly Hall was an immense Polygonal structure in the heart of the capital, and that was where the Circles dwelt… or more accurately _hid_ , as it was the case now. It took Bill no effort to make himself as huge as the building, and he took a moment to adjust his bowtie - may as well look dapper while taking over that place - before snapping his fingers.

“Here, fishy fishy!”

The screams in the streets below him seemed to increase in volume when blue fire enveloped the roof, entirely destroying it in moments. And right there, in the council room at the heart of it all, the mighty rulers of that wretched world sat, paralyzed with terror. They had colors on them now, like everyone else in that world, most of them in hues of red and purple.

“Hiya,” Bill said, peering down at them and tipping his hat. “Just a PSA - I rule. Like, _literally_ . Name’s Bill Cipher, new supreme ruler of this place, and I’ve got a bone to pick with you. Just thought you’d like to know why you’re wearing _those_ ,” he added. Another snap of his fingers, and chains appeared around the arms and legs of each Circle in the room.

“What… how… what’s the _meaning_ of this?” the Chief Circle shrieked, trying and failing to break free. Bill laughed.

“There’s no meaning to _anything_ , wise guy. Not anymore,” Bill said, and reached down to grab him. He lifted him up so that he could see and hear everything - the blinding colors all around them, the panicking population, his friends shattering the last of their chosen Isosceles guard, their laughs mixing with cries and pleas and the roar of fire in the distance.

“LISTEN, EVERYONE!” Bill shouted, his voice powerful enough to send a shockwave across the dimension - so that everyone in it, even those who weren’t there to see him, could _hear_ . “The Circles were a bunch of hacks! The Laws of Nature were made up and are gone! Name’s Bill Cipher, and there is only one law from now to eternity - _no_ law. This party never ends - so join it, or _join him_!”

He lifted his hand higher, the Chief Circle still held tightly in his fist, and ignited it.

His screams weren’t quite as loud as Bill’s own voice, but still loud enough. Down below them, the citizen had stopped screaming and running around to look up, eyes wide. It was as though time had stopped and they could only watch in stupor as what had been their supreme leader until minutes earlier was turned into a charred, blackened lump.

Then Bill opened his hand to let said charred lump fall on the ground below, and chaos broke out again. Bill shrugged it off - they would learn to see things his way, sooner or later, and see that it was much better than anything they had ever known - and glanced down at his gang. They were done turning the Isosceles guard into a broken heap of angles and lines, apparently: only a few were still twitching weakly. Teeth was trying to get a spear out of his molars and Pyronica still holding a couple of guards in her burning hands, while 8 Ball was laughing at something Paci-Fire had just said. Knowing him as he did, he was probably boasting about his body count.

“Hey, guys! The building over there is the prison - mind to tear it open if you’ve got a minute? See if you find any friend of mine in there.”

“Yeah!”

“Sure thing!”

“Let’s get ‘em out!”

Bill watched them go, and turned back to the chained Circles. No more than a hundred of them, and yet they and their forefathers had controlled their dimension for so long. Few, and weak - weaker than even the lowest of Isosceles, with no defense against their sharp angles and even less against the Women’s points. That was why they had relegated them to the lowest place in society, wasn’t it? Or, at least, the second lowest. Lower still there were the Irregulars: too few to rebel, but enough to make the others feel blessed even in their wretched condition. So many lies, such tight control and all due to pre-emptive fear. He could see it all so clearly now. It was so _obvious_.

And the least Bill could do now was providing an excellent _reason_ for that fear.

“Hey, guys. Got a question for you,” Bill told the quivering bunch, lifting his hands again and willing his body to _change_ \- his surface turning black, and his eye red. A few very satisfying cries ensued. He narrowed his eye. “Answer correctly, and I will let you--”

“Have mercy! Please! We’ll do any--”

A beam of blue light, the crackle of electricity, and they all screamed.

“Bleep! Wrong answer!” Bill exclaimed, and ended the shock. Fun as it was, he didn’t want any of those frail little things to succumb just yet. “C’mon, lemme ask my question. Maybe you’ll surprise me,” he said, and leaned closer - so close that his eye blotted out even the sky. “Tell me the name of every single Irregular you’ve had destroyed.”

“That’s… that’s impossible to know!”

Bill laughed. He’d been doing that a lot since he had come back, but who could blame him? He had never felt so good before - all powerful, all seeing, crackling with energy and with everything within his reach… including revenge.

“Hahaha! Aww, your tiny minds are so limited! How cute!” he said, reaching down to give the Circle who had spoken a boop. Except that he squashed him instead, turning him into a wet spot on the floor. “... Whoops. Gotta practice on that,” he said, and shrugged. His eye turned to the others, who had been too terrified to even react to their companion’s demise. “Very well. I’ll make it simple for you - don’t really care about most of ‘em myself, anyway. Just for one. So tell me - _what was my brother’s name_?”

None of them knew. None of them lived.

But Bill made sure Liam’s name was the last thing they’d ever hear.

* * *

Unsurprisingly enough, tearing the prison open had been short work for Xanthar, and the others has taken care of any guards that might have tried to fight. Well, at least Pyronica and 8 Ball, who were both a whole lot bigger than anyone else from that world, and Paci-Fire. Teeth could still get something done due to being, well, _teeth_ \- while Keyhole and Hectorgon were kinda useless in a fight, really, not that much bigger than his kind.

Come to think of it, Bill should probably give them a few powers of their own. Later. Once he got a few other things sorted out.

“Hey, Bill! We found a guy who says he knows you!” 8 Ball called out, waving his arm as soon as he spotted him hovering closer. With the walls down there was a whole bunch of prisoners running away as quickly as they could, stepping over rubble and the remains of the prison wardens - but some had stayed behind, too surprised or scared to run. “One, huh… What was that again, little guy? Crapton? Craptos?”

“Kryptos!” Bill exclaimed, and made a hasty landing in the middle of what had been the prison’s courtyard. The prisoners still present stepped back; all but one, who was now blue instead of gray, but whose tilted frame hadn’t changed a bit. His mouth - separated from his eye, a feature as unusual as his tilted frame - hung open for a few moments, and Bill just had to laugh, stepping right in front of him. “What is it? Can’t recognize an old frie--”

_“Bill!”_

Even with the useful gift of near-omnividence, Bill hadn’t expected Kryptos to launch himself at him, grab his sides and start shaking him.

“Whoa! Easy there!”

“It’s really you! You’re alive! What has happened? Where have you _been_?”

“That’s a long story. And I mean _long_ ,” Bill said, grabbing Kryptos’ wrists so he would stop clinging to him. He glanced at the others. “Okay, everyone clear this place. Need a minute alone here.” They left right away, no one daring to argue, and Bill turned back to Kryptos. “You look like a Cyclocks chewed you and spat you out,” he informed him.

Kryptos blinked. “A… what?”

Oh. Right. No way he’d know. “I’ll explain later. Lots of explaining to do. You first, though. What about the others?”

“Gone,” Kryptos said, and seemed to choke up for a moment. Well, now that wasn’t unexpected, but it did put a hamper on the general mood. “They… Tad is gone. Him and Pentos. They were arrested with me, but they tried to escape, and… and I didn’t. I should have gone with them, but I was too scared. They didn’t even make it out of the city.”

Bill wasn’t especially sorry about it - Tad had punched him in the eye and really, he should have listened to him when he could have - but he didn’t say as much. “Nora burned, didn’t she?” was all he said instead. He knew the answer, but he asked anyway.

“Yes. With your store, when they came looking for you. She… she took a dozen of their guards down with her.  Even an Hexagon who was supposed to supervise the arrest,” Kryptos added, and this time he smiled some. “We always assumed you had been in the shop as well - we thought you were dead.”

Bill gave a brief laugh. “Heh! I’m full of surprises.”

“ _They_ were fuming when news came. Tad wouldn’t stop laughing. They hit him so hard that they bent one of his sides, and he still laughed.”

Alright, so maybe the guy hadn’t been quite the bore Bill had thought him to be. “What about Esther, Randall and C-C-Croatoan? And Hillmann?”

“Hillmann was killed during the arrest. Esther was executed. They made her talk first - I don’t know how they got to her, maybe someone was careless and let something slip. I know they took her children. They said they would spare them if she gave them our names.”

Except that they hadn’t. Kryptos didn’t need to say as much for Bill to know it. “So she gave us all away,” he said, but he wasn’t angry, not really. It was more than _some_ would have done for their kids.

_You let them take Liam away!_

“They gave her no choice, Bill.”

 _Don't give me that crap. There is always a choice, regardless what the Circles tell everyone. This was mine. Make it worth something_.

Nora had willingly killed her own father and herself to buy him time. Esther had given away all of them, even her sister, for the slim hope her children wouldn’t be destroyed. A sacrifice in order to save something they deemed more important than anything else. At least for one of them, it hadn’t been for nothing.

“Can’t blame her,” Bill finally said. “Randall and C-C-Croatoan?”

“They escaped, I think. They were never captured. I don’t know where they’re hiding, or if they’re even still alive, and with what’s going on…” he paused, blinked, and looked around.

The prison he had languished and the guards who had filled it lay in pieces around them. Not too far away stood creatures he had never seen before. Everything around him, even the sky and his own body, was filled with colors he had never even imagined. In the distance, the once formidable fortress that was the General Assembly Hall was burning. All around them, cheers of the freed prisoners were mixing with the cries of bystanders whose tiny minds still couldn’t process what was going on.

Finally, after a long pause, Kyptos’ eye turned back him him.

“Bill,” he said, “what in the Circles _is_ going on?”

With a shrug, Bill reached to put a hand on his back. “I’ve come to liberate our dimension, that’s what. You’re welcome. Have a Martini,” he added, snapping his fingers. A glass appeared in Kryptos’ hand. He took a look at it, then gave a laugh that was more than slightly unhinged.

“I have no idea what you’ve been up to, but it’s good to see you again,” he said, and chugged down the whole glass before throwing it away to shatter among the ruins.

* * *

The pieces of the broken hourglass cracking further under boots alerted Time Baby of the arrival of the surviving members of the Time Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron - which was to say, all of those who hadn’t been in the arena to uselessly try stopping Bill Cipher’s rampage.

Time Baby turned to see them lining up before him. “Time Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron reporting,” one of them spoke up. “If needed, I can have the trainees called to--”

“NO NEED,” Time Baby cut him off. Not many of them were left, true, but it didn’t matter. They would be enough for the task at hand: all that mattered was doing everything _quickly_. “LEAVE THEM TO THEIR TRAINING. IT IS NOT A FIGHT YOU’RE HEADED TO. WE CANNOT DESTROY CIPHER.”

A few nervous gazes were exchanged. “Then… then what can we do?”

The hourglass on Time Baby’s forehead glowed.

“ _CONTAIN_ HIM.”


	12. Interlude: Billy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's another brief interlude. It is somewhat relevant to the next chapter, I promise. Can't promise you'll like how, though. Guess we'll find out on Friday!

"... Mother? Can I see him?"

" _May_ I see him. With all the books you read one would expect your grammar to be correct, if nothing else."

Liam pauses at the door, unsure as to whether he is allowed in or not. His parents don't want him to stay too much around Bill, because he's come from a line of Isosceles, and until his frame is firmly set there is thought to be a risk it may be corrupted again through unconscious imitation. At least, that's the reason why those like him are never allowed to meet their birth parents again.

There have never been instances of a new Equilateral being corrupted by an Irregular like Liam, but his parents are unwilling to take risks, because Bill is their only chance to ever raise a normal child. Law forbids anyone who produces an Irregular from breeding again and, until offered to adopt Bill, they had thought their line would end with Liam.

"May I see him?" he finally dares again, his eye shifting to the crib at the far end of the room.

His mother hums, looking for something in a drawer. She is rarely still, always busying herself with some chore; if there is nothing to do, she will make it up. "Just look. Don't touch him and for Circles' sake, don't wake him up. Getting him to sleep is a chore and a half."

It's more than what Liam expected to get, and he gets in the room quickly, before she can change his mind. She's pretending to be still busy, but he's acutely aware of her gaze on him, to make sure he doesn't try to reach for the infant.

In the two weeks Bill has been there, Liam has got only a glimpse of him. Most of all he's heard him, because Bill wails a lot: for food, for attention, just for the heck of it. It always gets his parents to rush to him, to make sure everything is fine, to feed and entertain him. His mother holds him a lot, too. Liam wonders if she used to hold him like that, too, when he was a baby. He can't remember. If she ever did, she doesn't do it anymore anyway.

The building bitterness fades when Liam peers into the crib. It is a bit annoying, because all things considered he has all rights to be bitter. He is an Irregular despite his parents being both perfectly Regular, while Bill is a perfect Equilateral despite _his_ parents being Isosceles. Bill is getting all the attention, all the proud looks and remarks Liam could never have, and he's not even their child. They even gave him his name, too, like neither of them even cares that they _already_ have a son called William. He's an Irregular. He was an accident. He doesn't count.

And if anything that is said about Irregulars is true, then he should be wrathful and bitter and just plain mean-spirited. Everyone, even his parents, probably expect him to hate the baby.

But all Liam can think when he sees him up close for the first time is that he's just so _tiny_. He's only one inch and a half long, which makes Liam feel so much taller from his own four and a half inches, and he's sleeping on his back, eye closed. His hands are so tiny, too, and his feet are tangled in the baby blanket he must have kicked off himself before falling asleep.

"... Was I this small when I was born?" Liam askes, his voice very quiet so he won't wake him up, and turns to look at his mother. She looks back at him, and for a moment - only one moment - something in her eye seems to soften. It happens, from time to time, and Liam treasures those looks. He never gets them from his father.

"You were very small, yes."

Her voice sounds gentler than usual, too. Liam logs that detail in the back of his mind, to recall when a bad moment comes, and looks back into the crib to realize that Bill is not sleeping anymore: his eye is wide open, and he's staring straight up at him.

Liam has a moment to panic and think he's going to start wailing again, that his mother will blame him for it, before Bill finally giggles and reaches up to him with short, stubby arms.

… Wait. Does he want him to pick him up?

A hand closes around Liam's arm to pull him back, away from the crib, before he can fully process that. "I had told you not to wake him up!"

"But I didn't do anything!" Liam protests. His mother scowls, but she doesn't get too mad, if anything because Bill is not wailing. He's squirming and kicking, making some noises that sound a lot like _'bababababa'_ , and that's it. She sighs, and lets go of Liam's wrist.

"Go back to your room," she says, and with that she turns back to the crib.

Liam leaves quickly, closing the door behind himself, but he lingers there for a few moments, blinking fast. He can't recall any other time when someone actually _wanted_ him come closer and touch them. It's because Bill doesn't know any better, of course, and it's surely going to change when he grows up and learns that something about him is very very wrong, but still...

"I think he likes me," he tells the empty hallway, and all of a sudden he feels elated. He returns to his room with a spring in his step that wasn't there before.

* * *

Next time he gets into that room, his mother is out and Billy is wailing. A lot.

The door is locked, as always when there is only Liam in the house and no one can make sure he doesn't spend too much time with the baby, but something his parents never realized was that the key of his father's study opens that door, too. And besides, what else can he do? His mother is not coming back for another hour at least, and Bill is screaming his lungs out.

He can't be hungry, because he's sure his mother fed him before leaving, so he's probably just being fussy. Maybe he poked himself in the eye: it happens a lot with babies, because they try to suck their thumb but aren't very coordinated yet, so sometimes they stick their finger in before they've turned the socket into a mouth.

"Billy? Can you stop crying? Please?"

Asking nicely doesn't work. Neither does poking him, apparently. Finally, after a moment of hesitation, Liam reaches in the crib to pull him out, baby blanket and all. That will help, right?

It works like a charm: the moment he's picked up, Bill stops wailing like a switch has been flipped. He blinks, makes a sniffling sound, and looks at him. And giggles.

It's all really cute, until he reaches up to poke Liam's eye and giggles even harder at the resulting yelp. Then it's not so cute anymore. But at least he stays quiet - okay, _almost_ quiet - while Liam fetches a book and reads him a story, clinging to his arm and staring down at the pictures on the book, and it's the best company Liam's had in a long time.

* * *

"... And I'm taking this one, too."

Randall's brow raises when he looks at the book Liam is putting on the counter. "Oh, this? Aren't you a bit too old?" he asks with a laugh. He's the owner of the local bookstore and he's always been kind to him - he tells him a lot of interesting things, recommends new books and he even pretends not to notice when Liam starts reading the books right off the shelves. Not many people would be _that_ nice to an Irregular.

"It's not for me," Liam says a bit defensively, putting the money on the counter and gathering the books in his arms. He reads a lot and he knows he's smart - his one true strength - and he doesn't want Randall to think he's regressing to kiddie stuff. "It's for Bill. He likes it when I read him things."

"Oh," Randall says, realization dawning on him. "I see. Your parents' new child, is it?"

Liam straightens himself. It's not an easy task, because his Irregularity makes him lean a lot on one side, but he thinks he does pretty well right now.

"My baby brother," he corrects him, and leaves the store with the books held tight in his arms.


	13. Trapped

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would like to apologize in advance for this chapter and point out that altairattorney should get 50% of the blame.

"Eew, stop that! It's giving me the creeps!"

Bill laughed at Keyhole's protest, and made his eye roll back into the socket one more time just for the heck of it. "Turns out I can see through anything that's my same shape, not matter where in the multiverse! Like a peephole or something," he said. He hadn't _quite_ gained unlimited knowledge, though he knew a lot of things, but now he had the means to gain it, or at least to get close: all he had to do was _watch_ and-

"WHOA!"

"Watch out!"

There was a cry and then a crashing sound, a couple of curses and further sound of breaking glass. There had been a lot of windows in there - they had taken residence in the remains of the Hall for time being, as people out there kept running in circles and crying for their old boring life - but there weren't many left now: Kryptos and Hectorgon's attempts at flying had taken care of those left intact by Bill's attack.

"You know, guys, _I_ learned how to do that in moments," Bill pointed out, sitting back on what had been the Chief Circle's bench. "And took on Time Baby."

"Hey, _you_ are still trying to figure your powers out, too," Hectorgon pointed out, getting back on his feet - which was to say, hovering slightly above the ground. "And besides, I was going just fine. _He_ hit me."

"Oh, shut up. Let me try… wait, wait, I think I got the hang of it!" Kryptos exclaimed, and hovered a few feet from the ground as well. "Whoa. I mean… whoa."

That was kind of cute, Bill thought: the power he had given them was little to nothing compared to what he held, but they seemed elated anyway - especially Kryptos. "You're welcome," he said with a shrug, then rose up in the air. "How 'bout a race? All the way to… uh…" Bill paused, and turned to give a quick glance outside to look for a landmark of some kind. Hard to find any: most of the buildings were just rubble by now.

The streets were pretty much empty, because of course the citizens were all cowering somewhere. Bill had decided not to bother trying to get them to come out or even to make contact again: sure, he ruled that world now, but it wasn't like he was interested in _ruling_. As far as he was concerned, no law was needed: let the lot of them learn to enjoy his new world, or cower in their old one.

Some had already joined the party, especially the ones who had come out of the old prison whose remains were still burning in the distance. It was on it that Bill's gaze eventually fell.

"Race ya to the prison - big fire on the right," he finally said, and sped off without another word.

"Hey!"

"Wait! You got a head start!"

"What were you _expecting_ , suckers?" Bill called back with a laugh, and just sped up. Those two had no hope to keep up with him anyway, so it wasn't like he needed to cheat, but hey - why not?

He made it to the ruins when they were still barely halfway through, and realized they weren't quite as empty as he had expected: Pyronica wasn't too far away, digging up something from a pile of rubble that must have been part of the Irregular Hospital - right next to the prison, to remind Irregulars what their place was. Bill immediately hovered down behind her and peered over her shoulder.

"Watcha doin'? Whoa, watch out with that thing!" he protested as soon as Pyronica turned, very nearly taking out his eye with one of her horns. Bill was sure he could regenerate it, but he'd sooner spare himself the trouble. "Only got one eye her- okay, what's that?"

Pyronica gave him a wide grin, lifting up what she had found. It looked like a bunch of very small squares fused together, each of them with its own eye, but with only one set of arms and legs. All of its eyes were blinking blearily, clearly trying to clear out the dust. "No idea, but it's cute! I found it under the rabble. Can we keep it?"

Bill shrugged. "Can't see why not," he said, and peered closer at the… thing. "So, what are you, amorphous… thing?"

The response he got was a garbled mess, and caused Pyronica to frown in confusion. Bill, on the other hand, could understand pretty well.

_We are too many for only one name_.

"Ooh, gotcha! So what, did the lot of you fuse together for the heat of the fire, or what?"

Another garbled response only Bill understood. It wasn't one he liked.

"... Wait, an experiment? They used pieces of executed Irregulars to _make_ you?"

"They did that a lot. I found out in prison."

Bill turned back to see that Kryptos had reached them and was hovering a few feet away from him, his mouth set in a tight line. Further back, Hectorgon was trying - without much success - to catch his breath after the race.

"What were they even trying to do?" Bill asked, but deep down he didn't really care about their reasons: all he could think of right then was Liam, all he could do was wonder whether his body had been used for something like it, too.

Kryptos shrugged, and turned to glance at the remains of the prison where he had languished for the seven years Bill had spent in the Infinetentiary. "Guess they were trying to figure out how to give people extra sides with better chances of success. Or how to fix Irregulars."

Fix them, of course. There was a lot of talk about _fixing_ Irregulars. Bill remembered Liam talking about that from time to time, how he had hoped some way to fix him may be found before the Inspection came for him. He had always shrugged those words off, certain as he was that no one could possibly be stupid enough to think Liam was anywhere near expendable.

_Still worried for that dumb Inspection? Don't be a chicken. You'll be fine. When they see how smart you are, you being a freak won't matter anymore_.

_But Liam was smart! Real smart! He could have-_

He could nothing, his father had said then. But it had been a lie. He could have done a lot. He could have done _anything_. He could have changed that wretched world, and he surely would have been a lot _nicer_ about it than Bill could possibly bother to be.

He scowled, and his eye fell back on the amorphous shape that apparently had no other name than just that - Amorphous Shape. He snapped his fingers, and a faint white glow appeared around it.

"Okay, you guys… it is _guys_ , isn't it? Lots of you in there. Okay, great. So, you guys are in. Congrats. You can fly now. Practice with the other newbies here," he added, and turned to hover away.

Suddenly, he didn't even feel like boasting for beating Kryptos and Hectorgon in the race. He could use being on his own for a bit. Unfortunately, Pyronica wasn't especially perceptive when it came to personal space, and she followed him.

"Hey, Bill. A dime for your thoughts?" she asked, coming to talk beside him. Bill didn't turn, but he did give a small laugh.

"Gotta pay more than that for _those_ , Ronnie."

"Aww, c'mon! Don't I get a friend discount?" she asked, giving his side a nudge. Not too long ago, that would have been enough to make him topple over. Now it didn't even change the trajectory of his hovering.

"Nope. Shouldn't you be off to find the people I listed to you guys, anyway?"

"Hey, I was looking. Then I found Amorphous Shape."

"So go back looking."

She rolled her eye. "You really are no fun today. So, what's crawled in your eye and died there? I mean, c'mon," she insisted, and reached to grab him and spin him around so he'd face her. Honestly, anyone other than her trying to do that right in that moment would have been blasted a couple of galaxies away. "You should be happy! Look at this world! You made it all better!"

Somewhere in the distance, there was an explosion. Screams followed.

"... Well. 'Better' is relative anyway. You made it a lot more fun! Me and the guys are loving it. I thought you were, too. We're free to do anything we want, with no dumb law to follow anymore! And it's all because you were smarter than Time Baby!"

Fine, that did help some. "Not too difficult, that," Bill said, but didn't really try to keep some smugness out of his voice. Pyronica's grin widened.

"Yeah, but still! You could have used the Time Wish all for yourself, and didn't," she said. Bill frowned a bit, wondering exactly which part of gaining immense power and near-omnividence did not figure as using the Time Wish for himself, but what she said next was enough to shut down any thought for several moments. "I mean, you could have used it to bring back your brother, and instead you used it to change a _whole_ dimension!"

_… What?_

Bill's sudden, stunned silence caused Pyronica to blink. "Bill? Are you okay?"

_You could have used it to bring back your brother._

"I…" Bill began, but he found himself unable to say anything. The colors in the sky swirled, filling his vision. All of a sudden, his eye hurt like the first time he had seen color. All of a sudden, his _everything_ hurt.

_I always wished I could see the colors_.

He never had. He never had because he was gone.

_Could have used it to bring back your brother_.

But he hadn't. He hadn't because the thought hadn't occurred to him until now, he hadn't because he hadn't even _thought about it_.

"Bill, what's-"

"Go away."

"But-"

"GO AWAY!"

Of the several things that happened all at once - his body turning black and his eye red, blue flame sprouting from his hands, the sky above them turning blood-red, his own voice loud as thunder, Pyronica turning around and bolting off - Bill was truly aware of nothing but the sudden ache somewhere in his center.

_He hadn't even thought about it._

Thousands had died in the chaos and anarchy that had followed Bill's takeover. Thousands more, including Bill Cipher's birth family, died when the sky turned black and meteors rained down.

He knew. He didn't care.

The one family he'd had was gone, and he'd missed his chance to bring him back.

… Or had he?

* * *

The stretch of land where the Second Dimension's weak spot was hadn't remained unschathed: the meteor shower had struck there, too, destroying what was left of the low stone construction that had stood there. But it didn't matter at all, because that was nothing but a marker and Bill knew where it was.

It was the way out of that dimension, but it was also the way through the fabric of time. Now that he knew how to use it - now that he knew how to open a passage, and had the power to do so - he could go wherever and _whenever_ he wished. It was so simple he could hardly believe he hadn't thought about it before: he would go back in time and ensure that Liam never died. He would snatch him from the executioners' angles and take him into his future - a better future, where no stupid law would make him an outcast for something as minor as mismatching sides. A world where freaks were in control and he could have anything he wanted by just _wishing_ for it.

Bill would give him knowledge to match his own, of course, because he was sure Liam would love that. He would see all the colors ever imagined and _more_. They would leave behind that dump of a world and travel through all ten thousand dimensions, and liberate them as well. They would be unstoppable, all-powerful, all-knowing and eternal, and no one - no one - would ever look down to them again.

He just needed to open up the portal, punch his way through that one weak spot in reality, and reach for what he wanted. It was easy. It should have been easy.

It was not.

Bill tried. Bill raged. Bill attempted time and time again to force his way through, but it was all for naught. The opening, be it through reality or through time, refused to open.

"NO! WHY?"

He knew the reason why the moment he asked, because his eye rolled back and he could _see_ what Time Baby had done. He could _see_ what he had accomplished, stretching his powers to their very limit to ensure that the weak spot - the only way out of the Second Dimension - would be a weak spot no more.

_IMMENSE KNOWLEDGE, AND YOU ARE STILL A FOOL. YOU HAVE CHOSEN YOUR NEXT PRISON, BILL CIPHER._

The shriek of fury that followed was heard across the dimension, drowning out even the crack of thunder and the deep rumble as the ground beneath him split. Something within Bill's mind - something that was already heavily damaged, like an angle distorted by too many blows - cracked further, ready to shatter for good.

* * *

"... He wouldn't kill _us_ , would he?"

8 Ball's question was met with a pretty grim silence. The bunch of them was sitting in the remains of an old building, some distance away from the General Assembly Hall, where Bill still dwelled. It looked like Time Baby had done something to keep them trapped there, but they hadn't really caught many more details, because none of them really dared to ask Bill a question while he was throwing a full-blown tantrum.

Truth be told, none of them felt safe even being anywhere near him - which was why they had been steering clear for… how long had it been again? A week? Something like that. And, if the thunders and earthquakes and tornadoes that shook the world were of any indication, Bill hadn't calmed down at all.

"Wouldn't risk going there, just in case," Pyronica finally spoke, and turned to glance at Kryptos. That made him a bit nervous, though he tried to hide it. He was kind of a newcomer - second last to join in, if one counted Amorphous Shape - and definitely less of a hardened criminal than any of them. Hectorgon and Keyhole were alright, and so was Teeth if he didn't count the fact he chewed just about anything, but the others were all pretty intimidating. 8 Ball was just plain scary, Paci-Fire kept muttering about millions he had slaughtered on moons, Pyronica was literally on fire, Xanthar was… well, Xanthar. Plus, Amorphous Shape was seriously creepy.

Not the kind of company he had thought he would keep one day, but then again _nothing_ had really gone according to any plan he may have had before being arrested.

"Say, do you think he's gonna calm down at some point?" Pyronica was asking. "You've known him even longer than us."

"Not really," Kryptos muttered, looking down. "As in, I knew him before, but I'd known him for a little less than three years before he disappeared and I was arrested. Only saw him again when he came back and you guys broke me out of prison, so you've spent more time with him, really. And when I knew him, he wasn't some kind of all-powerful… whatever he _is_."

Hectorgon sighed. "I wonder why he even cares so much about leaving this dimension. I mean, it's _ours_. A whole dimension! If he just were a bit more reasonable… what?" he asked, trailing off when Kryptos gave a sudden laugh.

"Do yourself a favor and do not use that word in front of Bill," he said. "Or else you can be _reasonably_ sure he'll blast you into smithereens."

"... Duly noted."

"Okay, but really, for how long is he gonna pout over this? Because-" Teeth began, only to trail off when Amorphous Shake spoke. Its voice was a garbled mess, but Kryptos had had some practice and was beginning to understand most of it.

_There are armed people_. _Behind that wall._

Kryptos nodded, his mouth suddenly dry, and spoke in a low voice. "Guys? We have company," he said, trying not to move his mouth too much. That was one of the pains of having it separated from his eye: everyone could see he was speaking.

To their credit, the others didn't even look around and kept acting normal - so normal, that, for a moment before Paci-Fire spoke, Kryptos thought he had spoken in a too low voice and had not been heard.

"Where?" was all he asked.

"Behind the wall on our left."

"How many?"

"Does it matter?" 8 Ball grunted. "Flatties are short work. 'Ronica?"

"Way ahead of you!" Pyronica exclaimed, and next thing Kryptos knew was that she had launched fire against the wall in question, causing it to explode and a whole bunch of Triangles, Squares and a couple of Hexagons to be thrown back. Xanthar charged the next moment, trampling most of them, so truth be told there weren't many left for them to trounce, much to Paci-Fire's chagrin.

However, Kryptos hardly paid attention, because the moment he rose up in the air he noticed something else. Someone else, someone he knew - a rather old Triangle with a limp, trying to get away quickly from what had been his hiding place behind a pile of rubble.

_Oh no, you don't_.

The Triangle let out a cry when Kryptos landed right before him, causing him to suddenly stop and stumble back. He landed hard on his lower side and tried to scoot back, but another bunch of rubble stopped him almost right away. He looked up, eye widened, just as Kryptos' shadow fell over him.

"Hi, Randall. Long time no see. Seven years, give or take a few weeks."

Randall's eye twitched from place to place for a few moments, as though he was trying to find an escape route, but he was trapped in a corner and he knew it. He finally looked up at him, his surface now a pale orange.

"Kryptos, you need to listen to me. This has to stop. This is folly, and-"

"Oh, you still remember my name. Nice. Thought you'd forgotten. Tad is dead, by the way. So is Pentos. Thanks for asking. What about C-C-Croatoan?"

"I… I don't know. I lost sight of him when we had to split to go into hiding. He might be dead - thousands have died, hundreds thousand. Maybe millions, Circles know-"

"Circles knew _nothing_ ," Kryptos cut him off, hands balled into tight fists. "Bill's the one with answers."

"Bill is insane! He's destroying our world! You can't seriously-"

"HE TOOK ME OUT OF THE PRISON WHERE YOU HAD LEFT ME TO _ROT_!" Kryptos screamed, taking another step forward. Randall recoiled, then he seemed to brace himself and scowled.

"We had no power get you out of there! There was nothing I could have done!"

Kryptos snorted. "Not willing to risk it, huh? Bill was right. You are a coward. And you grow a spine _now_ , to go against the one who's liberated this hellhole?"

"Bill is worse than even the Circles ever were!"

"Then you're gonna tell him that in person, because he'd like to have a chat with you, you know. Told us to get you to him if we found you or C-C-Croatoan. Good thing you just ran into us, huh?" Kryptos said, and reached to grasp him and pull him up. Old as he was, Randall could hardly put up any resistance. "Who knows, maybe seeing you will brighten his mood."

"Kryptos, please-"

"You should have listened to him when you could have," Kryptos cut him off. "Tad, too. He was wrong. _You were wrong_."

* * *

"If he thinks he's gonna keep me in here forever, he's so _wrong_!"

A blast of blue fire underlined his last word, shattering yet another column. There weren't many left and that normally would have caused the whole structure to collapse. Which was to say, if the laws of physics still meant something. As it happened, they didn't - no more than they applied to him. He should have been tired, after so much screaming and blasting anything within his sight out of existence, but of course he wasn't: energy did not get tired. Energy did not need rest - it was restless by definition.

Bill hadn't expected to find a downside to his Time Wish. He hadn't expected that dumb baby to lock him in, either. For an all-seeing being, that had been one aggravating lack of foresight. Time Baby must be laughing himself into hysteria over it, Bill thought darkly, and obliterated another wall.

Maybe he should start using it more, he thought, glancing at his hands. He'd been having so much fun wreaking havoc on his dimension that he had neglected the fact he could see _anything_ , peer into other dimensions and alternate realities alike. He probably had powers he wasn't even aware of yet - and really, he might just _see_ his way out of there.

… How about a quick look into a reality where he could go back in time and get Liam there, safe and sound? It was well within his power. Just a tiny peek before he got serious about it and found a way to make it happen in _that_ reality as well?

Well, why not? He hadn't seen him in a long time. It couldn't hurt, Bill decided, and let his eye roll back in its socket, opening his _other_ eye.

It _could_ hurt, and it did.

But not for long.

* * *

_"Bill, what is… this is… how… what have you done?"_

_"I liberated this place, Brainiac, that's what. No rules! No Circles! Told ya you bein' a freak wouldn't matter anymore! No need to thank me. Here, have a-"_

_"Are you insane? This is complete madness!"_

_"Yeah, but it's not too bad. This world sucked anyway, so hey. Here you are again in a better one. A fun one. Stop being a stick in the mood and let me show you-"_

_"You must stop this! Are you out of your mind?"_

_"Sheesh, you're welcome, Brainiac. Nice to see you too. How 'bout thanking me for saving your life and- Hey! Hey! Let go!"_

_"You must stop this! People are dying, Bill!"_

_"So what? People were dying before, too. Heck, you would have died if I hadn't come ba-"_

_"YOU'RE CRAZY! What's_ gotten _into you?"_

_"Wha- what's gotten into you, you mean! Let me go - don't think I'd go easy on you just 'cause you're my broth- whoa!"_

_"I am not!"_

_Wait, what?_

_"Liam-"_

_"I don't know who or what you are, I don't know what you've done to Billy, but I know this is not my brother's doing! It can't be! You can't be who you claim you are!"_

_"Oh, knock it off! Of course it's me! Just improved - not some little kid anymore. All-knowing! All-seeing! All-powerful! You can be, too! I thought you were the smart guy. Just join up. I mean, look! You wanted to see the colors? Here they are! You can see the Third Dimension, too, and a lot more! There are thousands of dimensions, and we can visit them all!"_

_"You're insane."_

_"Yeah, we've established that. Insane enough to come back in time to save your angle, though, so don't complain-"_

_"If this is what awaits, you should have let them execute me!"_

_"... What? Are you SERIOUS? I did the IMPOSSIBLE to bring you back! You have no idea what I've been through! I saved your sorry angle and THIS is what I get? You won't even waste your breath to at least THANK me?"_

_"Thank you for what? For destroying our dimension? For killing… how many people have died, Bill?"_

_"Who cares? You can't go for checkmate without sacrificing some pawns - and_ said pawns _would have left you to die for being a freak without a second thought! They already did!"_

_"I'd have preferred to die without seeing any of this! I'd have preferred to go without knowing what kind of monster you'd become!"_

_A scowl, a sudden sense of heat behind his eye. Bill ignores it. He will regret doing so._

_"Look, now you're startin to get on my-"_

_"I would have never left any of my books behind if I had known this would happen! This should not have happened!"_

_"Shut up."_

_"YOU SHOULD NOT HAVE HAPPENED!"_

_"I SAID SHUT UP!"_

_His anger explodes, and the rising heat behind his eye turns into a beam that gives Liam no time to speak, no time to move, no time to scream. When the light fades, only a moment later, there is nothing left._

_A moment of stunned silence follows, and then it is Bill to scream, his voice echoing through the multiverse._

_"No! No no no no NO! Come back! I didn't mean to! I DIDN'T MEAN TO!"_

* * *

Bill's eye snapped open, pupil blown wide. Something in his mind, something that was cracked and fragile and barely holding up, shattered beyond repair.

_I didn't mean to!_

It was too much. It hurt. He wanted it to stop. He wanted it _gone_.

The all-seeing eye chose not to see. The all-knowing entity chose not to know.

Bill Cipher chose to forget.

Somehow, the blue flames burning away any memory he held of Liam felt cold.

* * *

Kryptos wasn't sure whether the eerie silence that greeted them was a good sign or not.

Granted, there were no more thunders, the earthquakes had stopped and the tornadoes vanished - pretty much all at once. So, that had to mean Bill wasn't so mad anymore, right?

"Who's gonna go in first?" Teeth asked. The way he hid behind 8 Ball made it pretty obvious he wasn't gonna volunteer. Kryptos sighed.

"I am, I guess," he muttered, and took a step towards what remained of the General Assembly Hall. "Er… hey, Bill?"

"Kryptos, please!" Randall spoke up, trying with no success at all to break free from Paci-Fire's grasp. "You need to listen to me! This can't be what you want."

Kryptos scowled. "Still beats prison," he said coldly. "Take it with Bill and see if he's willing to listen-"

"HEY GUYS!"

"GAH!"

Bill landed in front of them with a crash, digging a small crater in the ground and throwing them all backwards before bouncing back in the air. He took a look at them and laughed.

"Heehe! Should have seen the look on your face! Faces. The ones who've got one or more, anyway. Was starting to wonder where you'd gone. I mean, coulda found you in snap, but still."

The collective sigh of relief was so loud Kryptos had to wonder if it was possible for it to be heard across the dimension.

"Sooo… not mad anymore?" Pyronica dared with a hopeful grin. Bill shrugged, waving his hand.

"Nah, I'm good," he said, coming to sit on one of her horns. He did that a lot, especially when they were up to something. "Can't remember why I was that mad in the first place."

"Uh, because Time Baby sealed us i- aaagh!"

As Xanthar landed on Keyhole - literally _landed_ on him - to shut him up, Bill just shrugged, letting his legs dangle. "Sheesh, relax. It's fine. That dumb baby is a pain in the angle, but he can keep me in only _physically_. I have other ways to get out, and I can find ways to get someone to open the passage up for us again. Just trust me - you _do_ trust me, don't you?"

"No."

"Nope."

"Never."

"Not in a million years."

"Hahahahahah! Well, you _do_ learn," Bill snickered, patting Pyronica's head and reaching up to dry a tear of mirth from his eye with his other hand. "But we're gonna get out, no worries. We'll just keep partying here until then, and when we finally- whoa, whoa, wait. Is my eye playing tricks on me, or that's old Randy? Paci, put him down," he said, getting off Pyronica's horn.

Randall let out a yelp when Paci-Fire dropped the old Triangle on the ground. Randall lifted himself on his hands and knees just as Bill came to hover over him.

"Well, look at that! Lookin' good in color, old friend! Missed me?"

"Bill, you need to put a stop to all this! Please, listen to reason and-" he trailed off with a cry, and Kryptos found himself wincing. But Bill hadn't hurt him: he had just snapped his fingers, lifting him off the ground as well so that they'd be at the same eye level.

"Ha-ah! I don't do _reasonable_ , Randy, remember?" he pointed out. The others snickered, and Randall shot Kryptos a glance that was nothing short of plea. He turned away, and the old Triangle had no choice but to plead with Bill. He may as well have saved his breath, but he still tried.

"Bill, you must know that this is insane!"

"Sure I do. I know lots of things," Bill pointed out with a dismissive wave of his hand.

"Then put a stop to it! This is worse than anything the Circles ever did! They and their peers deserved what they got, but the rest of us did nothing to deserve-"

"That's right," Bill cut him off, eye narrowing. "You did nothing. You have no idea what I went through while trying to do something for this dump of a world - and meanwhile, what have you been doing? What has everyone been doing? _Nothing_. You looked down and carried on. You let them have their way. Now let me have _mine_."

"I thought you wanted to make this world better!"

"Better, worse. Limited concepts for limited minds, old friend. And to think you read so many books! Hey, you know what happens when you gaze too long into an abyss, right?"

"The… the abyss also gazes into you?"

"Bleep! Wrong answer!" Bill exclaimed, and snapped his fingers. Randall stopped levitating and dropped on the ground with a yelp. "Nothing happens. 'Cause the abyss doesn't give a damn about you."

"You… you're not making any sense!"

" _Sense_ is overrated, old man. A mental cage built to keep all of us put in our _proper_ place," he added, making quote marks in the air, and began circling him. "I'm breaking that cage, Randy, even if it means breaking the minds that refuse to leave it."

Randall's confused, frightened expression turned into a scowl. He rose, and pointed a finger at Bill. "You have gone insane, you… you _monster_. This is nothing like the world Liam would have wanted! He would hate everything you have become!"

_Oh, boy_.

For a long moment, no one spoke and no one moved: everyone just froze and stared at Bill, waiting and dreading for his temper to flare up again… except that it didn't. Bill just paused in mid-air and blinked in confusion before speaking again.

"... Who the heck is Liam?"

The same, exact incredulity showed on each and every face - or whatever they had as a face. Kryptos wasn't sure what to think. Had he just forgotten about his brother? But how could it be? He used to bring him up all the time, saying that he was the smartest guy he had ever known, that he would have never known of the Third Dimension if it wasn't for him. How was that possible? Was he just toying with them, or he really didn't remember?

Randall's eye widened, and he sputtered. "What… how… no, this can't be! Liam! You can't have forgotten your-"

A beam of blinding light cut him off, and caused everyone else to yelp and back off. Kryptos shut his eye against the glare, and when he opened it again Randall stood exactly where he had been a moment before - arms raised, eye wide with terror, and entirely made of stone.

Above them, Bill shrugged. "He was getting boring, anyway. Have had enough preachin' to last me a lifetime. So, who wants to play a round of _Spin The Person_?"

They all did, though Kryptos had to wonder how much of it was simply out of eagerness to please Bill and keep him in a good mood. Maybe it was a bit of both.

Bill never brought Liam up again.

None of them was stupid enough to ask.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _"I mean, who would sacrifice everything they've worked for just for their dumb sibling?"_  
>  -Bill Cipher, Sock Opera.


	14. All-Seeing Eye

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, this is almost finished. In fact, this is the last "proper" chapter. There are two more coming - one last interlude, all about Bill and Ford's partnership, and then the epilogue, set right after the finale. I'll try to post them next Friday and the Friday after that respectively, so it won't be a long wait, I promise!  
> Meanwhile, have a Bill fucking up through history.

Years passed. Then decades, then centuries - then thousands and millions and billions of years.

Bill stayed. Bill saw it all. Bill knew _everything_.

All over the multiverse, civilizations rose and fell. Galaxies were born and extinguished. New dimensions were discovered, old ones forgotten about and left to decay - and no one was left to remember a time when the Second Dimension was known as such, when an orderly world had been where now there was only chaos, where reality itself came apart on a regular basis - its inhabitants having long since turned into misshapen, twisted things that defied reason.

The Nightmare Realm, everyone took to calling it.

There was talk of a demon ancient as time and of immortal demons to his command. They described him in the funniest ways: a beast with a hundred eyes - _seriously?_ \- or a creature of fire who ate suns to remain alive. None of them came even close, but who was he to complain? It simply meant that, whenever he found his way to the mind of an unknowing inhabitant of another dimension - because that dumb baby could only trap him there physically, but the astral plane and mindscape were his to roam - they would never imagine who he truly was. No one ever did. No one figured him out.

Not until it was too late.

Slowly, one after the other, the dimensions around his own began to _collapse_ , becoming part of the growing Nightmare Realm. All he needed to do was finding someone receptive enough for him to make his way to their dreams and mind, and get them to open the door from their side. It took work, sometimes, but he never failed: one thing he had learned soon in life was that flattery will truly get you anywhere.

Each time one dimension fell, those closest ones would tremble and strengthen their defenses. That slowed him down, but nothing more. Some dimensions, he took; others, he would rule behind the scenes throughout history by putting in control people he kept under his thumb, each of them unaware of who he precisely was and where he came from, but sucking up each word he said like water during a drought.

Let someone think they're someone special, someone _chosen_ , and they'll be your puppet as long as you need them to.

The Third Dimension, however - the one he had been shut out of, the one he most wished to reach and crush out of sheer spite - still eluded him. The biggest of all Dimensions, and yet the latest in its development: for the longest time, he could find no mind developed enough to grasp even a billionth part of the knowledge he could share, let alone to learn what was needed to create a bridge between their dimensions strong enough to override Time Baby's power.

But it didn't matter. He knew it would get there: he had seen what the future looked like, after all. And he knew that a day would come when a rift would be opened, and he could at last show the Third Dimension how to party. He had seen it - not in detail, not enough to know precisely when, but he had _seen_ it.

It was only a matter of time.

_When Gravity Falls and earth becomes sky, fear the Beast with just one eye._

A billion of years later, Mabel Pines would be the last person to fall for his trickery, and fulfill the prophecy.

* * *

"Hey, Bill! Was starting to think you weren't coming back this time."

"That long, huh?" Bill muttered, lifting himself up in the air and blinking some against the light. Much of his unlimited time was spent in the astral plane, leaving his body behind encased in stone, and returning to it always meant he needed a few minutes to adjust again to, well, having a physical form at all. In the end, he just decided to let himself drop on a few pillows. A snap of his finger and the fireplace - he had plenty in the palace he had built for himself, more because he liked them than because he needed them to provide any warmth - was filled with roaring fire.

Pyronica shrugged. "Not sure how long, but a while anyway. There were four- no, fifteen attempts at destroying you while you were away. Mostly guys from Dimension 194 - you know, the last one we sucked in? That. Most of those guys tasted _horrible_ , too."

Bill laughed. There had been countless attempts at rebellion, and even more attempts at destroying his physical form when he left it behind to travel through dimensions. None of it was surprising: his world was all about chaos, and chaos doesn't always take it well to obeying one master. It was in its nature, and Bill didn't mind. It made things a whole lot more fun and, really, their attempts were actually kind of adorable.

"Aww, sorry. Gonna take over a tastier dimension next time," he said, and gestured in the air to make a couple of Martini glasses appear. He took one, and Pyronica grabbed the other - not without flopping on the pillows as well, causing him to bounce a bit and nearly spill his drink. "You know you don't even need to guard me, right? I can recreate my physical form any moment when I come back here."

Pyronica shrugged, and emptied her glass in one go. "Hey, doesn't sit well with me and the guys to just let someone waltz in and destroy it. Gotta look after each other. Like in prison, remember?" she said.

"Have you forgotten the part where I got near infinite power and junk?" he asked, filling her glass up again with a quick gesture of his hand. Pyronica laughed and gave his side a light punch. She no longer needed to pull her punches with him, hadn't in a long time, but she did regardless.

"We _miss_ you while you're off, you doofus."

"Of course you do. I don't know what I'd do without me, either."

Another laugh, then she sat up with a grin. "Oh! Here's something funny - I actually caught Kryptos speaking to your statue while it was his turn to guard."

Bill blinked. "... I'm not sure how I feel about that."

"I know, right?" Pyronica snickered. "Teeth, too. He said some sort of joke, I think. Whatever it was, must have been fun. He kept wheezing and laughing to much he couldn't finish."

"Huh. What else?"

"Paci felt like reminding you he slaughtered millions on thousands moons. By the way, he gets on well with the eye-bat thingies from Dimension 987 - you know, the ones that turn things into stone? He can give them commands with his mind, only that at first there was a language barrier and they kept thinking he was asking for them to get him socks. They followed him everywhere just to drop socks on him. Only that they turned them into stone first. It was hilarious - too bad you weren't there," she added, and there was an accusing note to her voice that didn't escape him. Fine, few things escaped him, but that was so obvious it would have been easy for him to pick up even before he became all-seeing, all-knowing and all that jazz.

"Hey, I was busy. Meddling with the multiverse's business is hard work, you know."

"So take a break before you're off again. Party's not nearly as fun without you around," she said, and held up her empty glass. "Fill it up?"

"Sheesh, just admit it's a bartender you missed," Bill said, but he did fill up their glasses.

Pyronica grinned. "That, too. Oh, and Hectorgon's been boasting that he can go faster than you. Been claiming he'd challenge you when you came back.

"Hahahahahah! Now that's rich! I'm going to challenge him first and destroy him."

"Huh… figuratively, right? Just checkin'."

"Maaaaybe," Bill said, and finished his Martini. "So, where are the guys?"

"Out with the new ones. There's a guy with, like, eighty-eighty different faces. Or eighty-seven. Or eighty-nine. Gotta ask again. He's kinda touchy about that. Oh, and there's that Magma guy, bet you're gonna like him. We've also got this funny one with a head… wait, no, he's actually kinda just a head, with one arm like…" she paused and rested her elbow near the top of the head, failing her limb around to emphasize her point. "He'a always hungry, poor guy, and keeps asking people to step in his mouth, but it's not really working."

"Gee, I wonder why," Bill said, rolling his eye. "Sound like we've got plenty new people."

"Yup! Lots of prisons in the last dimension we absorbed!"

It was nothing Bill didn't know, as he was able to see how things were going there even from the astral plane, but it was still good to hear. Most inhabitants of the dimensions he liberated were so unused to freedom that they rejected it, of course, but there were some - usually outcasts and criminals, more often than not ones who had been locked up for quite a while - who didn't mind joining the eternal party at all.

Maybe he could take a break after all - enjoy the party himself, and just check every now and then that his puppets stayed in power in the dimensions he couldn't absorb into his own. The Second Dimension - or Nightmare Realm, he kinda like that new name better - still held up, but its reality was unstable, and he could tell it was ready to tear itself at the seams if he overdid it and expanded it too much. Energy could not be destroyed, sure enough, but Bill doubted it would result with a pleasant experience… and the others probably wouldn't survive it to begin with.

No, the Nightmare Realm was large enough now. He would just keep projecting himself into the right minds to keep other dimensions under his control… and, most of all, keep his eye well fixed on the dimension he _really_ wanted, if anything to spite the one who had thought he could keep him out of it.

_Think you can outsmart me, stupid baby? Think again._

* * *

It took hundreds of millions of years for the apes on Earth - that tiny planet in a tiny galaxy among millions, the one Time Baby would take over in a distant future if allowed, the one where the fabric of reality was thinnest - to actually, slowly start turning into something else.

_Humans_. Just not especially smart ones, even compared to the amazingly limited beings he had met in his time in the Infinetentiary, when he had been limited as well but at least already had a thing called _personality_. His first meeting with the newly evolved species was, to put it mildly, underwhelming.

"Oookay. So, guess I'll give you a few more centuries?"

"Guuughr."

"Wow, _rude_. Okay, maybe a few thousand years? How 'bout that? Think you guys will be smarter, then?"

The human squinted at him, then reached to scratch his butt with a stick he was holding. A _sharp_ stick. With predictable results. "YEOWCH!"

"... All right, make it a few millions."

* * *

The second attempt was some three million years later, and it involved a slightly smarter human. Plus a stick with a sharp rock on top of it.

"Hey there, meatsack! I'm-"

With a roar, the human thrust the stick through Bill's core.

"Whoa! What the- seriously?" Bill protested, crossing his arms. The stick remained stuck through him, but of course it didn't hurt: they were in the mindscape, after all. "What's wrong with you?"

"Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn!"

Bill rolled his eye. "Oh, knock it off! That guy's overrated, anyway. Plus, he stinks. Literally," he muttered, and snapped his fingers, leaving the mindscape.

Better give them another million years or two.

* * *

_Gravity Falls, 4,000 BC_

"Hello there, pile of bones. Name's Bill Cipher and- hey! HEY! Stop throwing pointy things at me! I'm trying to share knowledge here!"

The human paused and blinked before lowering the bow - why would one keep bow and arrow even in their dreams? - and giving him a quizzical look. "Uh… sorry?"

"Oooh, look at that! It can speak!" Bill laughed, and hovered closer to the young woman staring up at him with wide eyes. "Let's try again, shall we, Khi R'hi?"

"How do you know my name?"

"Oh, I know a lot of things. Name's Bill Cipher, and-"

"An odd name," she declared, reaching up to poke him. "I shall call you Arrow Tip."

"... Well. I've been called worse. Stop poking me. Can we get back to me telling you what I am and you being amazed? Yeah? Awesome."

"Am I dreaming you?"

Bill blinked. "Hey, you meatsacks did get a lot smarter lately! Evolution's done! Now there's just the learning part," Bill exclaimed, reaching to ruffle her hair - only to pull back his hand with a scowl. "Eew, lice. Right. Stone Age problems."

Khi R'hi blinked. "Who _are_ you?"

"The guy with answers, that's who. Here to solve your problems," Bill said, and let his eye roll back in the socket to show several images in quick succession, causing her to back off with a yelp. "Interesting mind you've got. Lots of worries, though. Little sister's sick, huh?" Bill added, letting one image remain in his eye longer than the others - that of a child no older than ten. "And you'd do anything to save her."

Her wary expression turned into sorrow. "She needs more meat. More nourishment. That's why I'm hunting."

"Nu-uh. What she needs is some medicine you guys don't know how to make yet - luckily for you, _I_ know!" Bill said, eye rolling back to normal. "I can show you _just_ what to pick and how to brew it! She'll be back on her feet in no time and live to the grand old age of fifty-five!"

Just as quickly as it had come, sorrow turned into hope. It was kinda fascinating, watching that. Humans were a whole lot more expressive than Bill's kind had been, that was for sure. "Can you truly do that?"

"Of course! I might need a little something in return, but it's a minor detail we can discuss later. Have we got a deal?" he added, and held out his hand, igniting it with blue fire. Khi R'ih winced and stared at it for a few moments, causing Bill to roll his eye.

"C'mon, kid! Shake on it?"

"Shake?"

"Oh. Right. It's a handshake. Just grab the hand and give it a good shake - you won't get burned, no worries. Yeah, like that - atta girl!"

It was the first of many, many deals with the humans living in that place, the one spot on the planet where the barrier between dimension was the thinnest. He held his half of the bargain, and Khi R'ih's sister healed. She held hers by telling the elders about him, and showing them how to summon him so that he'd have free access into their minds - even those that were normally not receptive enough to let him in.

Bill wouldn't share _all_ of his knowledge, of course, but even the crumbs he gave were enough for those stupid meatsacks to trust him utterly. They listened to him. Did as he said without question. And what he asked of them was that the means to summon him would be recorded, written inside of a cave of his choosing, protected by a ritual to ensure nothing would destroy it.

"Someone's gonna come here sometime down the road - not sure exactly who, but I know it will happen. And they've got to summon me at the right time - that's important, okay? Keep that in mind, guys."

He didn't return to that place again for a long time, because there was nothing for him to do there until the day he'd be summoned. He didn't bother looking, either, which was a mistake.

Had he turned his eye there more often, he may have seen the moment a terrified, sweaty man who did not belong to that time and age appeared out of thin air inside the Elder's hut. He may have seen him using a device to take him through time, to show him what would happen. He may have seen them going to the cave and trying, unsuccessfully, to erase the instructions to summon him. He may have seen them resorting to adding something to the cave's paintings instead - a warning not to summon him… and a wheel.

Thousands of years from then, a man looking for answers would ignore the warning. Not too long afterwards, his scorned brother would break the wheel.

Unaware of all of it, Bill Cipher kept shaping the world's history so that it would be ready for the day his chosen pawn would summon him. And shape it he did.

With varying degrees of success.

* * *

_Atlantis, 2,500 BC_

"... Whoops. Hehe. My bad!"

* * *

_Egypt, 1250 BC - Ramses II_

"Sooo, yeah, things might have gotten a bit out of hand, but that was all. I mean, it was just a few locusts and frogs and funny-colored water. And an eclipse. No big deal, so no worries. It's not like anyone will write a book about this or anything. All's peachy."

"... My firstborn died."

"So what? You have, like, twenty-five more kids. Busy guy, huh?"

"There is _fire_ raining down."

"Meteors. Pretty sight, dontchathink?"

"People are dying!"

"Really now, can't you lighten up even a little?"

* * *

_Samos, 520 BC - Pythagoras_

"And therefore, the area of the square built upon the hypotenuse of a right triangle is equal to the sum of the areas of the squares upon the remaining sides."

"... Huh. Not that it's _wrong_ , but why would a triangle have squares on all sides? I mean, that drawing looks kinda, er… not like something you'd show kids where I'm from, if you get what I mean."

"It is absolutely revolutionary, and I owe it to you."

"What?"

"I thought it up looking at you."

"Well, _whoa_. You know what, smart guy? Now I'm feeling _mightily_ uncomfortable. Glad I could help been great to meet cha, _Bill out BYE_."

* * *

_Athens, 360 BC - Plato_

"... Also, got to be careful with this kind of thing. Last time I kinda sunk Atlantis."

"Sunk… what?"

"Heh, that's actually a funny story! Just don't go telling everybody about it, 'cause it was kinda embarrassing. So, it was a Tuesday…"

* * *

_Misenum, 79 BC - Pliny the Elder_

"So the cynocephalus, or dog people, live right by the Sciapod people with only one leg?"

"Hu-uh. Sure. Sciapods have to hop around to move. Kinda funny. Do write that down."

"And where do they live again?"

"Er… the edge of the world. Far away from here. Like, _real_ far."

"Oh. I wouldn't be able to see them myself, then."

"Afraid not. But hey, you know what we could go take a look at? I heard there's this really cool thing going on in Pompeii right now…"

* * *

_Alexandria, 415 AC - Hypatia_

"Aw, C'MON! Are you still giving me the silent treatment over that dumb Library? I _told_ you it was an accident!"

"You are an accident."

"Whoa, _rude_. "

* * *

_Florence, 1500 - Leonardo Da Vinci_

"Hey, you know what you should do with that lizard? Build it wings and horns, turn it into a dragon and scare the crap out of people."

"That would be absolutely childish. I have important projects to finish."

"So you're gonna drop everything to turn the lizard into a dragon."

"Obviously."

* * *

_England, 1666 - Isaac Newton_

"I told you a million times, gravity is a lie!"

"The scientific evidence is overwhelming!"

"What, you'd trust _scientific evidence_ over the talking triangle in your mind? Sheesh, _thanks_. Great to feel appreciated."

* * *

_Washington, 1776 - Thomas Jefferson_

"For the last time, Bill, I am not writing _that_ on the back of the Declaration of Independence."

"C'mon, don't be a bore. I'm sure Ben would do it."

"That's precisely why Franklin is not touching this draft again."

"Spoilsport."

* * *

_Gravity Falls, 1980_

"The One with Answers."

Just as the words left his mouth the cave seemed to grow just a bit darker, but Stanford Filbrick Pines hardly noticed: his full attention was on the drawings illuminated by his lantern, painted in bright colors and amazingly well-preserved for being at least four-to-six-thousand years old. He let his gaze wander over the images, pausing on a wheel that showed… wait, were those glasses? Was that a sack of ice?

Most people, he knew, would take that as a sign the drawings in the cave were much more recent than they were made to look like - maybe a prank of some kind - because it was simply impossible for the ancient natives of that land to have known of the existence of those objects.

But not him. Having been there for almost four years, having seen what he had seen, Ford had come to strike the word 'impossible' out of his vocabulary. Unlikely, yes. Improbable.

But never _impossible_.

His eyes skimmed over the writing next to the wheel - 'TO VANQUISH IT', it read - and then back to the triangular shape at the center.

_The One with Answers. The All-Seeing Eye._

There was an incantation to summon it, too, at the other end of the wall, next to the warning 'DO NOT READ'.

One thing Ford had learned was that such warnings were not to be taken lightly. On the other hand, he had also learned that no one had ever changed the world by being too careful. Plus, he was desperate - his research having hit a dead end he couldn't seem to come out of, no matter how hard he tried.

_The One with Answers._

And answers were all he desperately wanted.

Stanford Pines lifted the lantern higher, read the summoning inscription - how odd, Latin words written in characters belonging to a far more ancient language, forgotten by all long before Latin even existed! - and waited.

Nothing happened. Or so he thought.

* * *

"And so I told them - no, no, hear this out - I told 'em-"

_Triangulum, entangulum. Vene foris dominus mentium. Vene foris videntis omnium!_

"WHOA!"

8 Ball blinked. "You told 'em 'whoa'?"

"Was expecting somethin' else."

"Yeah, me too."

"Really, what did ya… Bill?"

But Bill did not answer: he was somewhere else entirely, in the mindscape of the sucker who had finally come along to summon him, having left behind a stone statue still holding a Martini glass. It was lifted as though to raise a toast, and it actually kinda fit: there was a good reason to toast, after all.

It was _time_.

* * *

"Well well, what do we have here? Yup, daddy issues. Go figure."

Bill closed yet another door and took a look around, at the starry sky, instruments and books floating around. It was an interesting mindscape, that of Stanford Pines, although having been summoned allowed him just a superficial look: those doors in the mindscape were windows to some of his memories, the ones in the very back of his mind, but he couldn't actually get through himself, and that was barely scratching the surface.

It would change once he got that sucker to let him into his mind willingly, of course. But even with so little to go by, he could tell he was dealing with someone whose intellect and thirst for knowledge was unmatched by any other of his kind Bill had ever met, and he had met _plenty_ of them. Not that it was going to be terribly relevant - nor very impressive compared to his own knowledge, really - but him being such a smart monkey would make it easier for him to follow his instructions and, at last, build the kind of bridge Bill wanted between their worlds.

It was just perfect, Bill thought with a cackle, and hovered to yet another floating door for a peek. May as well get to better know his most important pawn ahead of the big game, after all, and what better way to do it than- oh, hey, a childhood memory. How adorable.

"Listen, dorks, and listen good. You're a six-fingered freak, and you're just a dumber, sweatier version of him. And you're lucky you have each other because neither of you will ever make any friends! Hahaha! Dorks and losers!"

"Hey. Don't let those idiots get to you."

"But I _am_ a freak. I just wonder if there's anywhere in the world where weirdos like me fit in."

_Still worried for that dumb Inspection? Don't be a chicken. You'll be fine. When they see how smart you are, you being a freak won't matter anymore_.

… Wait, what the heck was that? That just now hadn't come from Stanford Pines' memory at all. Bill frowned, trying to remember where he had heard that before, but his mind drew a total blank. Maybe he had just imagined it - his imagination _was_ pretty wild after all, if he said so himself. He closed the door and moved on to take a look at the next memory he came across.

"This was no accident, Stan. You did this! You did this because you couldn't handle me going to college on my own!"

"Look, this was a mistake! Although if you think about it, maybe there's a silver lining. Huh? Treasure hunting?"

"Are you kidding me? Why would I want to do anything with the person who sabotaged my entire future?!"

Aww, a betrayal! Now that was cute. Those meatsacks were so sensitive, they couldn't even handle-

_Thank you for what? For destroying our dimension? For killing… how many people have died, Bill?_

… Ugh, not again - that wasn't coming from Stanford Pines' memories, either, and he couldn't place it. It was weird, and not in a way Bill liked. "Fine, okay, enough with this," he grumbled, and slammed the door shut. He didn't need to know Stanford Pines' life story just yet anyway - and besides, he was just about to fall asleep: he could tell. Soon enough, he would feel the slight ripple telling him he had been pulled into his mindscape and finally, _finally_ get to work.

_And once this world is mine, Time Baby, I'll melt you along with the arctic before you even get a chance to-_

The ripple came, and Bill could see, through the many eyes in the mindscape, Stanford Pines wandering through it, gaze wide - funny, how humans had no idea what their _own_ mindscape even looked like unless Bill pulled them in - before grasping a sheet of paper in mid-air to read it. He didn't look up when Bill hovered closer, until he was right behind him.

Very well. Time to impress… and, if the guy's startled expression when he suddenly turned around was anything to go by, he had made an impression alright.

"Hiya, smart guy!"

"Gah!"

Holding back a laugh - it was funny, just how much he looked like a startled owl - Bill began circling him. "Woah, don't have a heart attack! You're not ninety-two yet!"

"Who are you?"

"Name's Bill," he replied, tipping his hat. "And your name's Stanford Pines, the man who'll change the world! But I'm getting ahead of ourselves; let's relax! Care for a game of interdimensional chess?"

A thought was all he needed to summon precisely that, plus seats. Stanford was still confused and still looked a lot like an owl, but Bill managed not to laugh. "Have a cup of tea," he offered before settling down and making the first move with a knight.

Stanford looked hesitant, but he did make a move, then another - and by then, he was already looking like he was enjoying the game.

"Haven't had a good game for a while, huh, Sixer?" Bill asked, moving his Bishop forward. "Gotta be hard, with a mind like yours - hard to find someone who's a real challenge, I betcha."

Stanford raised an eyebrow, and hesitated for a moment before making a move. "Well. I would say you are a challenge, uhm… Bill, was it not?"

"Bill Cipher," he confirmed. Another move, and he captured one of Stanford's pieces. "The One With Answers. The All-Seeing Eye. You called me, remember?"

Comprehension dawned on Stanford's face. "Oh, I see. The incantation from the cave - that is what summoned you, isn't it?"

"Well guessed - though it wouldn't have worked for a mind less brilliant than your own," Bill lied, throwing in some flattery just in case. "Hey, drink your tea before it gets cold. You always let it cool, don't you?"

"Heh. True, I suppose that when I get carried away with work I forget… wait. How do you know that?"

"I know _a lot_ of things. It sorta happens when you're around for… wow. A _long_ time, come to think of it. But I like to think I'm still young inside. Got your bishop," he added, gesturing it off the chessboard.

Stanford frowned slightly at the board, then made another move - and not a stupid one, either. He was good at that, and actually made for a decent challenge as long as Bill avoided taking a peek into his next move. "So… what _are_ you, precisely?"

"I am a muse, Stanford. Every century, I choose… hey, _hey_. What's with the raised eyebrow? Were expecting you some goddess with long flowing hair, a robe, maybe a cithara in my hand?"

That made him chuckle. "Well… that _is_ the traditional portrayal."

Bill rolled his eye. "Just because people don't pay attention, that's why. I mean, I'm everywhere through history. Check in your wallet if you don't believe me. Plus, the look doesn't really work for me," he said, snapping his fingers, and a robe and wig appeared on him. He frowned. "Or does it? Never tried it. Does it bring out my eye?" he asked, leaning forward and batting his eyelashes.

Stanford made a noise that sounded much like a snort, and pressed a six-fingered fist against his mouth to hide his smile. "... A-hem. Doesn't really suit you, no."

"Yeah, I think I'll stick to the hat and bowtie. Much classier. Anyway," he added, making the robe and wig vanish with a gesture and leaning back on the seat. "I am here to help you out of the slump your research got into. I choose one brilliant mind a century to inspire, and you? You're the lucky winner, Sixer. You hit the Knowledge Jackpot! Oh, and you also lost a pawn. Your move."

Stanford blinked at him for a moment, then his face opened in a smile that most might have described as hopeful, but Bill would more likely describe as 'nerdy'. He leaned forward, eager as a schoolkid. "So you're here to help me unlock the mysteries of Gravity Falls?"

Look at that, Bill thought. As expected, taking advantage of that guy was gonna be easier than stealing candy from Kryptos.

"Wow, you sure think small for such a smart guy. Think BIG!" Bill exclaimed, and lifted his arms. Around them, a grid rose, showing equations that contained answers to most, if not all, the questions mankind had been asking throughout their existence. "I can, and will, help you unlock the mysteries of the _universe_ and more! I'll guide you into-" His eye fell back on the chessboard, and he paused. "... Did you just capture my rook?" he asked, more than a little taken aback. That hadn't been a planned loss _at all_.

Stanford leaned back on his seat, and this time he had a grin on his face that was nothing short of smug. "Your move," he said, then, "tell me more."

_I've got him_ , Bill thought, and almost laughed in triumph. Almost. For now, he had to hold back… and to take care of another detail first.

"With pleasure, Brainiac. Here's the first bit of knowledge - _no one_ has ever beaten me at chess before," he said, eye narrowing, and made his move.

And, even though he _really_ couldn't remember anyone ever beating him before, something in the back of his mind stirred when those words left him - the annoying sensation that something was amiss.


	15. Interlude: Stanford

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This turned into the longest interlude yet. More than twice the word count it was supposed to be and I had to force myself to end it. That's how much I enjoy writing these two.

For days after his odd dream, Ford Pines buries himself into research.

Well. To be entirely honest, he's always buried in research: it's what he does best, and what he loves most. What changes now is the subject of his research - one that pops out simply _everywhere_ he looked, now that he knows what to look for.

"Even in my wallet," Ford mutters, resting his elbows on what little free surface the table had that was not covered with books, scrolls and notes. He presses the heels of his hands against his eyes, which are reddened and feel scratchy from the lack of sleep.

The Eye of Providence, references to a being with answers, to binding contracts and amazing events and feats whenever those were involved. How could he not notice before? How could _anyone_ not notice?

"They didn't know where to look."

Bill's voice comes suddenly from right behind him, causing him to wince and turn around. There he is, hovering in mid-air, eye on the clutter on the table. He gives a low whistle. "Wow. You really get serious about research, don't ya?"

"I thought you couldn't come into the physical world."

"I can't. You fell asleep, smart guy. With your glasses on. That's gonna leave a mark," he says, and comes to sit on Ford's shoulder. He does feel solid, and it's hard to remember that, at the moment, they are both just astral manifestations of themselves. "So, what did you find out?" he prods, an elbow resting over Ford's ear.

The smugness in his voice is such that Ford can't hold back a laugh. "It's how you said. You're all over history."

"See? Shoulda taken my word for it instead of staying up researching for, what, forty-nine hours?"

What, was it that long? Ford glances at the far wall, where the clock is, but he can't read the time: there is a smiley face where the numbers and arms should be. Bill shrugs.

"Don't bother with _time_. You're dreaming, so it doesn't count. Just- whoa. You've got some fluffy hair right here, Fordsy."

Ford blinks. "Er… thanks?" is all he can say while Bill stands up on his shoulder to ruffle his hair with both hands.

"And look at that, no lice! You humans sure have come a long way from where you started," he says, and Ford feels his - scarce - weight being lifted from his shoulder and then dropping on his head a moment later. "Comfy!"

"... Are you making angels in my hair?"

"Let a muse have some fun," Bill retorts, but he does lean over so that he's looking into Ford's eyes, just upside down. Even so, the hat perched on his hea- upper angle doesn't fall. "I mean, there's a lot of work ahead of us. May as well get started with the right spirit, partner."

_Partner_.

It's been a long time since last time anyone has called him that: the last one to do so was Stan, and afterwards… well. He hasn't truly spoken much with anyone there in Gravity Falls, but college wasn't that bad. He had actually made a friend for himself for the first time - but with Fiddleford it was always 'buddy', never _partner_.

He has missed that.

* * *

"Your turn to roll the dice!"

"... I thought we were supposed to do science here."

"There is science behind all of this!"

"Is there?"

"Roll the dice to see how you fare against the illusions of Probabilitor the Annoying! Yes, that's the way to... Yes! Look at all that damage! It's over 9,000!"

"Huh. Great. Can we get back to-"

"With pen and paper, shield and sword, our quest shall be our sweet reward!"

_Okay. Okay. You can do this, Cipher. You need this guy. You can do this. It won't be long_.

* * *

Bill Cipher cannot recall a moment in his existence - over a trillion years now - when he's been speechless.

Apparently, there really is a first time for absolutely _everything_.

"What do you think? I did some redecorating!"

"Huh…" Bill says, eye shifting from the tapestries bearing his image to the pyramidal crystals, to his image on the carpet and then to the golden, amazingly tacky statue of himself on top of what's nothing short of a shrine. "... Where did you even find that?"

"I dug it up!" Ford exclaims, sounding incredibly proud of himself. "Must be something the ancient natives left behind! It must be over 2,000 years old - amazing craftsmanship for the time! I figured it would be nice to give it the place of honor. Do you like it?"

There are very few things Bill enjoys more than flattery, and even fewer things he likes looking at than his own image: his palace in the Nightmare Realm is full of portraits, and statues of him are pretty much everywhere across the dimension. Sense of measure is not precisely something he has in spades. And yet…

_You're creeping me out, Sixer. Congrats. Takes a whole lot to creep me out. Maybe we should take a break or something? See other people?_

But of course that's not an option: the portal must be done, and Stanford Pines is the guy for the job. At least this is a good sign - it means he trusts him… right?

"... Love it, Sixer," Bill finally says. "Did a pretty great job with the place. Oh, hey, I think someone's calling from hyperspace. Be right back!" he says quickly, and disappears from Stanford's mindspace before he can say anything more.

* * *

"You know, you're welcome to stop laughing any time this millennium."

"Hahahahahaha! Oh gosh- hahahha! I'm sorry, but this is just too cute! You went to get a tool and got a fanboy! Did he - heeehe! - did he already ask to keep your bowtie so he can sniff it at night?"

Bill rolls his eye and finishes his glass in one go. "No. Coulda lived without that mental image, Ronnie. _Thanks_."

"Anytime!" Pyronica grins at him, then pokes his side. "Look on the bright side, boss - you sure got him good. Getting him to open up the passage will be a child's play!"

"True," Bill concedes. He has to admit that, when he's not creeping him out or trapping him into never-ending, amazingly boring board games, Stanford Pines is, by far, the single best pawn he's ever had.

Like many before him, he loves to have his ego stroked. He relishes in flattery, and that makes him gullible. His issues help, too, issues so obvious Bill hardly needs access to the depths of his mind - a clever mind, he has to admit, one he'd like to know more about - to see them.

A birth defect, never feeling like he belongs, the connection to anything unusual, the need to prove himself by going beyond anything achieved before - it all adds up to a chronically insecure human who sees in his own intellect his only true strength, perpetually searching for a big break, knowledge and _validation_.

In short, the very best puppet material.

"Hey, maybe he'll even join the party when we can get it started! It's been _forever_ since we got someone new in the gang!"

Bill can't say the thought hasn't crossed his mind - because a freak would fit right in with freaks, wouldn't it? - but it's much too early to call it. He can't take risks by letting him on what's really in the works until the deed is done. Then he'll make his offer, and see if Stanford Pines is _really_ as smart as he thinks he is.

* * *

"... And so the moon landing was faked? Are you positive?"

"Absolutely. The moon doesn't even exist - the thing you see up there is a disk hiding alien space surveillance."

"Ha-ah! I _knew_ that landing couldn't possibly be real! There are too many things that don't add up, like-"

Stanford prattles on for a while, and Bill lets him. It's not very difficult to guess it isn't often he gets to ramble with anyone about his discoveries and theories; it's not very often he speak with anyone at all, really. By now he knows his habits - that he has just about everything delivered to his home, and has hardly met any of the townfolk a few times, exchanging even fewer words. Works for Bill: the fewer people approach them now, the easier this will be.

Now that Stanford thinks he has found a kindred spirit, it seems that the floodgates have opened. He talks and talks, asks questions, talks again - and he's eager to see him, to the point he has started taking mild sedatives to sleep more before Bill shows him how to enter the mindscape through meditation.

Of course, there is a catch to be able to do it. Well, not really - but Bill lies, he always does, and Stanford Pines falls for it hook, line and sinker. To no one's surprise.

"I've got to have free access to your mind, Sixer. Will make it a lot easier for you to get in touch whenever you want - just think you wanna talk to me, and I'll come over. I'd also be able to borrow your body. Kind of a big thing, really, so if you wanna think it over-"

"No need," Ford cuts him off. "I have already made up my mind. You're free to come in and out of my mind any time you wish. There is so much we can accomplish as a team, and I couldn't possibly trust you more!"

That seems just so easy that Bill, as much as he loves it when things are easy, pauses and blinks. "... Are you being sarcastic?"

Stanford seems taken aback. "What? No. Why would I?"

So, he's really _that_ dumb. Oh well. Works for him, Bill thinks, and shrugs. "Just checkin'," he says, and holds out his hand. "So, deal?"

"It's a deal - from now until the end of time!"

"Just let me into your mind, Stanford!"

"Please, call me… a friend."

A friend. This puny meatsack thinks himself his _friend_.

Bill laughs and laughs and laughs - but only after he's shaken his hand, and the deal is done.

* * *

"Your hair is _really_ fluffy!"

"Bill. You're pulling it out."

"Hey! What was that?"

"What was what?"

"Some kinda tingly thing in your head. When I pull like this, see?"

"I'm guessing it was pain. You really shouldn't be doing tha- watch out for the stool!"

"Whoa!"

_Crash_.

Ford winces and covers his eyes with non-corporeal hands. "Bill?" he calls out, not daring to look.

"Hahahahah! This is amazing!" Bill's laugh reaches him, and he dares to peer down at… well, his own body, doing angels among scattered papers and books that were on the table Bill collapsed onto only moments ago. The grin on his face is impossibly wide, and two yellowish eyes with slit pupils turn up to him. "I had forgotten pain was a thing! And hey, hey, check this out!" he adds, closing an eye, then the other, then the other one again, a finger pointed up at him. "Now you're here… now there! Now here! Now there again!"

Ford finds himself chuckling. For an all-seeing and all-knowing being, he's surprised by the most ordinary things. But then again, why would an immortal being older than their galaxy - older than time itself, Bill had boasted once - care to know what life as a mere human would be like? "It's a matter of perspective. It happens when you have more than one eye, and they're not in the same exact position."

"Oh! And this!" he adds, and sticks a finger in Ford's mouth, biting down on it. "Can keep my eyes open while chewing!" he announces around his finger.

"... I might be best not to bite on that," Ford says, more than slightly worried he might bite it clean off. Bill laughs again.

"So? You've got extras anyway," he says, but does pull the finger out of the mouth and grins up at him, elated. "Wow. I mean, _wow_ \- everything hurts everywhere!"

That's not precisely something Ford has ever heard said with such cheerfulness before. It's kind of worrying, really. "... Nothing's broken, is it?"

"Naaaah," Bill drawls, and rolls over his - Ford's - stomach. "Okay, okay, gotta get up. I've got this. Just... how do you balance this thing?"

"Through the vestibular system. In the inner ear, there are three semicircular canals that-"

"Hey, hey. Gimme some credit, I know the technical part. Just gotta figure out how- I've got it! I've got it!"

Bill sways a lot one way and then the other and very nearly topples down the stairs, but at least he does manage to stand up and take several steps. Ford gives a silent sigh of relief.

"Yes, that's how you do it! You… never did this before, did you?"

"Lemme think…" Bill pauses, and frowns. Well, Ford's face does. It feels surreal, watching himself from outside like this, and… and… is his nose always that red? "Nah, don't think so. No one let- huh, never actually got a buddy who'd let me borrow their meatsack. I mean, body. Yeah. Body."

Ford blinks. "Oh," he says. "But I thought, that with all the minds you inspired…"

"Geniuses can be real sticks in the mud, Sixer," Bill says, repeatedly flicking Ford's nose while gazing in the mirror with clear fascination. "Would listen to all I had to say and they _really_ liked getting all the glory, but me? Don't think they liked poor old me that much. Guess they feared I'd outshine them if they let me pilot their body. I told better jokes than most of 'em."

In a not too distant future, Ford will wonder how could he not realize he was being baited, how calculated each and every word was, aimed to use each and every of his own insecurities as leverage. Right there and then he just frowns at the thought of how plain unfair that was to Bill - and at the memory of the betrayal he felt when he realized that Stan had destroyed his project simply because he couldn't stand the idea Ford could strive to carve out a path in the world on his own, as his own person, no longer part of a matching set. His intelligence was all good and dandy as long as it meant he could benefit from it, but the moment Ford had wanted to use it for _himself_ , he had sabotaged him in the lowest possible way.

"The world should know about you," he finds himself saying. "They should know how much you have done."

Bill laughs, and it's actually just a bit unnerving, because the voice is Ford's own, but he's never laughed like that in his life. "In due time, Fordsy. In due time. Let's focus on your work first. That's the _most important_ thing. Now-" he trails off suddenly, and frowns before looking down at his - Ford's - stomach. "Hey. What was that? Did you eat a troll while I wasn't looking?"

"Huh? No, of course not."

"Something's _grumbling_."

"... Oh. I believe that's hunger. I didn't have breakfast, come to think of it. Or dinner. Or… no, I think I did have lunch, yesterday. Maybe."

"Oooh, right! This vessel needs nourishment!" Bill exclaims, and grins up at him. "Never tried to eat and drink as a person!"

Ford laughs. "Well, to the kitchen, then. There's a first time for everything!"

It is a bad idea.

Ford spends the rest of the day, once back in his body, in an emergency room - trying to explain a very perplexed nurse how he got beer in both of his eyes and whole chicken leg bone lodged in his stomach.

"Well. It was fun, though," Bill tells him later, glancing down at Ford's body on the operating table. "Chess?"

* * *

"You know, you could turn that surgery scar into a smiley face if you just added another-"

"Bill. No."

* * *

"Bill. What did I tell you _not_ to do?"

"Add a scar to make a smiley face."

"And what did you _do_?"

"... Add a scar to make a smiley face."

* * *

The call comes one morning towards the end of July, but Bill only finds out that evening - when he gets into Stanford Pines' mind to find out he's not home. Or at least, not in his home in Gravity Falls: the home he's at is the old one, the one Bill has seen through old memories where Stanford Pines is never alone.

He is alone now, though, sitting on the lower bunk of a bunk bed in his childhood bedroom, elbows resting on his knees and face in his hands.

"Hey, Brainiac. You look like the Head in the lake chewed you up and spat you out."

Ford winces, and looks up. "Bill," he says. "I… wasn't sure you could follow all the way here. Sorry I left so suddenly."

"I've got a door to your mind, smart guy. Will be able to follow anywhere unless you leave your brain on the nightstand or get a metal plate in your skull," Bill points out before shrinking just enough to sit comfortably Stanford's shoulder. "So, what's the word?"

"... My father's not well."

Not much of a loss in Bill's opinion, but he gives Stanford's ear a sympathetic pat. "How bad?"

"Very bad. He has little time left. I… I already knew that, but I kept postponing my visit. I had so much to do. We had so much to do. And now that it got worse, he doesn't even recognize me. I came too late. He kept asking for Stanley, and he acted like I was a total stranger."

_You shouldn't be here. Please, leave._

Bill chases the memory away. "Must suck. Got to see your brother?"

Stanford shakes his head, burying his face in his hands once again. "No. We don't even know where he is. Mom has been looking for him, but he's just _vanished_. In the end I took off my glasses and pretended to be him, so that dad could think…"

He trails off and stands up abruptly, causing Bill to fall off his shoulder, but he doesn't even pause to look: he just wipes his eyes beneath the glasses and speaks again in a husky voice. "I can't sleep in this room. I don't know why I bothered to unlock it," he says, and marches out without another glance behind, slamming the door shut. Bill stays behind for a few more moments, hovering in mid-air, then he frows slightly and lets his gaze wander across the room.

It is old, and dusty as only rooms that have stayed empty for a long time can be. He can kind of see where Fordsy is coming from, really. It makes only sense to keep its door firmly shut - a locked room for a missing brother.

Something in the back of his mind stirs, or tries to. Bill chooses to ignore it without even realizing as much.

* * *

It isn't long after that day that Bill brings up, for the very first time, the possibility of building a portal.

"I mean, you figured that out already - all the weirdness in Gravity Falls is due to that: the fabric of reality is _thin_. Easier to punch a hole there than anywhere else. It would give your answers and, what's better, lots more _questions_ to answer. A whole dimension of weirdness, all yours to figure out, and… hey, Fordsy, pick up your jaw. Still following?"

Ford closes his mouth and clears his throat. "I… yes," he says, and moves a rook forward. "Do you truly believe it's feasible?"

"I don't believe anything, Stanford. I _know_ things. Of course it's possible - for you, that is. You're weird enough to do it."

That causes Ford to blink. "I'm… what?" he asks, entirely unaware of what's going on in Bill's mind, behind the all-seeing eye that refuses to see, refuses to remember.

_Perhaps it wouldn't be too crazy to think you might take it a few steps further. You're weird enough to do it - Irregular as I am, just as unfit for this world, but they can't see it_.

Bill pauses, and for a moment he seems almost confused. "Smart," he finally says. "Smart enough to do it. Don't know where that came from."

Ford smiles a bit. "I thought you knew a lot of thin-"

"Clearly not this," Bill cuts him off, his voice razor-sharp, causing the smile to die on Ford's lips. Bill seems to notice, and shrugs. "Sorry 'bout that. Had a funny moment," he adds, making the chessboard disappear with a flick of his hand.

"I am sorry," Ford says. "I… shouldn't have teased you."

"Hey, hey! Seems fair - I tease you all the time. Don't worry about it," Bill says, and lifts his hands. The operating room disappears, and they are once again in the mindscape - only that it seems oddly empty, starry sky as far as eye can see, with none of the books and papers usually floating about. Another gesture from Bill, and grids rise all around them - grids filled with graphics, equations and instructions. On equation in particular catches Ford's eye, and he adds something to it - only for Bill to change what he wrote.

"This is something unlike anything else you've worked on - your world's logic doesn't apply," he points out. "But that's why I'm here. Remember what you told me to call you, Brainiac?"

He does. "A friend."

"And you meant it, didn't you?"

"Of course!"

"Perfect. Because _this_ is how genius happens, smart guy - with a little help from a friend," Bill says, and gestures to something before them, something that looks much like an inverted triangle with a hole right in the middle. "Here's what the portal's gonna look like. You may need help to physically build it, though - four hands are better than two and I'm not of much help there. Know a guy who might help?"

Fiddleford, Ford's mind immediately supplies, and he smiles. "I believe I do, yes. I actually think you'd like him, and-"

"Whoa there, wait up. Can't tell anyone about me, remember?"

"He's trustworthy."

_I am not_.

"Hey, that's the rule. No telling anyone. If he figures out this work's not just yours, then he does. But let's keep this under wraps until then."

_Plus, I kinda wanna find out how you're gonna explain the shrine thingie. You creep_.

Stanford nods. "Alright," he says, and glances at the portal's outline before smiling a bit. "That's not going to land me in an emergency room again, is it?"

Bill shrugs. "If it's gonna land you anywhere, Sixer, it's among the stars."

This one time, he's not lying.

* * *

Thanks to a rather ill-timed accident with his lab assistant, Stanford Pines finds out the truth earlier than he should have - but not early _enough_. Her can shut down the portal, but he can no longer close the tear he's opened. It's not enough to get through, but it's the start of something that, much like Bill himself, cannot be stopped.

"... So, I take it the guy won't be joining us?"

_All-knowing! All-seeing! All-powerful! You can be, too! I thought you were the smart guy. Just join up._

Bill scowls, but doesn't turn, so they can't see it. "He'll either wisen up and do just that, or disappear with his boring old world. Doesn't matter."

Still, when Stanford Pines goes as far as placing a metal plate in his skull to keep him out for good, Bill _rages_ \- because there is nothing, _nothing_ he hates as much as being shut out of a place where he has every right to be. Stanford had no right to call off their deal. When the wayward brother returns to kick Brainiac through the portal, Bill puts out a generous reward for his capture across all of the dimensions he has indirect control over.

He doesn't really expect someone to catch him, and in fact no one does for the next thirty years. But it doesn't matter: all he needs to do is wait. They will meet again. He _knows_ they will - and he knows that Stanford Pines will be _very_ sorry he crossed him.


	16. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaand this is it. Feels like yesterday that I began writing this, and we've reached the end already. Wow. I can only hope it won't disappoint!  
> Thanks a lot to everyone who's read/reviewed/faved/liked/kudo-ed this. I hope you had a good time reading - I sure had a good time writing.
> 
> I'll be posting some extras for this fic - mostly snippets that didn't make it into the final draft, but also ideas I had that just wouldn't have fit in the story itself - as _Flat Minds._

"Summer in Gravity Falls can last as long as you want it to! I just need you to get a little gizmo for me from your uncle."

_When Gravity Falls and Earth becomes sky..._

"Just a little more summer."

_… Fear the Beast with just one eye._

* * *

"At last! At long, long last! The gateway between worlds has opened! The event one billion years prophesized has finally come to pass! The day has come! The world is finally mine!"

The moment the glass breaks and the rift opens is a moment of pure, unbridled triumph. Everything Bill has felt, everything he has achieved in billions of years was nothing, _nothing_ compared to this. The last dimension to elude him, the one he's always wanted, is finally his - a world full of possibilities, even more so that he's there to liberate it from everything putting a stop to all that wonderful, wonderful potential.

His victory is complete. The longest game of chess has come to an end, and he's _won_.

"This party never stops! Time is dead and meaning has no meaning! Existence is upside-down and I reign supreme! WELCOME, ONE AND ALL, TO WEIRDMAGEDDON!"

* * *

He's not at all surprised when good old Fordsy tries to shoot him back into the gateway. He's been working to stop him and developing weapons half of his pathetically short life, after all; to be honest, Bill would have been disappointed if he hadn't tried.

And after he fails, because _of course_ he fails, Bill feels generous enough to extend his offer once again. Maybe it's the sense of triumph making him sentimental.

"Now don't look so sour, Fordsy. It's not too late to join me. With that extra finger, you'd fit right in with my freaks!"

_I'd have preferred to die without seeing any of this!_

"I'll die before I join you! I know your weakness, Bill!"

… Ah well. No one can say Bill didn't try. The stubborn goat can have it his way, and Bill could really use a back scratcher made of solid gold.

* * *

He doesn't worry when Pine Tree gets away. He doesn't worry when Time Baby shows up, and relishes in getting him out of the way. He doesn't worry when Gideon turns on him. He doesn't worry when Pine Tree reaches Shooting Star's Bubble, and he doesn't worry when they burst it - because at that point he's busy dealing with Ford, to get that dumb barrier down and let him out of that stupid town.

Sixer is _really_ pushing his luck - he should know by now that there is nothing Bill loathes as much as being shut in, nothing he's not willing to _do_ in order to get out - but Bill is willing to repeat his offer one more time.

"Listen, Ford, if you just tell me that equation, finally your dimension will be free. Anything will be possible. I'll remake a fun world- a better world! A party that never ends with a host that never dies! No more restrictions! No more laws! You'd be one of us. All-powerful. Greater than anything you've imagined! And all I need is your help."

_All-knowing! All-seeing! All-powerful! You can be, too! I thought you were the smart guy. Just join up_.

_You're insane_.

"You're insane if you think I'll help you!"

Very well. If this is how he wants it to be, so be it. One way or another, he will make him talk. As Ford just said, he _is_ insane. And he has long since forgotten what mercy even feels like.

He doesn't worry when the mortals start fighting back. He should have.

* * *

The door slams shut. The fire flares up. Bill understands. And he remembers, all of a sudden, what _panic_ feels like.

"Let me outta here! Let me OUT! _Why isn't this working_?"

Panic turns into something else, something he fails to recognize as despair. It is hard to name emotions he has not felt in billions of years - but that makes them all the more frightening. Fright, too, is something he had forgotten all about. For the first time since he can remember, Bill doesn't know what to do. For the first since he began existing, he falls on his knees.

_No, no, no, no, NO!_

"Hey, look at me. Turn around and look at me, you one-eyed demon!"

Stanley Pines towers above him. Stanley Pines, the one and only mortal to have tricked him - the very last person he will ever see. And for a moment the All-Seeing Eye doesn't want to look, because if he cannot see something it means it cannot be real. This cannot be happening.

But it is happening, and he does turn. He looks up, to a hard-set mouth and eyes that reflect the flames all around them; for a moment, they seem to be burning with a fire of their own. "You're a real wise-guy, but you made one fatal mistake: you messed with _my family_!"

_So tell me - what was my brother's name?_

Flames close in a circle around him, terror sets in, and Bill stands for one last, desperate attempt at bargaining.

"You're making a mistake! I'll give you anything! Money! Fame! Riches! Infinite power! Your own galaxy! Please!"

_Have mercy! Please! We'll do anything!_

_WHAT WAS MY BROTHER'S NAME?_

_You messed with my family!_

"No!"

Stanley Pines says nothing: he just stares, and as his form begins distorting - as he feels everything he is and has ever been being torn apart despite his struggle to hold on, to keep himself together - Bill Cipher knows that he won't yield, that no amount of bargaining or begging will save him.

_"What's happening to me_?"

He knows what's happening, he knows it well - and as he loses control over his own being, he knows there is only one chance for him not to disappear here and now. He refuses to go, refuses to make this his last day, he refuses to let them and their _rules_ win.

_A-X-O-L-O-T-L! My time has come to burn! I invoke the ancient power that I may return!_

He doesn't know why he screams Stanley Pines' name. He doesn't know why he rushes towards him, knowing full well that he's barely holding it together, that there is nothing he can do - and a well-placed punch is all that it takes to make him shatter.

He screams.

It is the last thing he remembers doing before darkness falls.

* * *

His screams echo through the fog, but no one answers. No one is there to hear: there is only him, wandering in the twisted paths of his _own_ mind, unable to leave it, unable to tell how much time has passed - hours, days, millennia or more than that - while a thick fog makes it difficult for him to see anything at all. The All-Seeing Eye, unable to see where he's even going.

Would be funny enough to laugh at, if he wasn't just a bit too busy screaming endlessly.

He still exists, for they were unable to destroy _energy_ , but he is more of a prisoner than he's ever been. It should anger him, fuel him, get him planning for bloody revenge to unleash on the multiverse the day he's finally out of that prison of stone. It should, but it does not. Instead, it _frightens_ him - and that is one thing Bill has no idea how to deal with.

"Let me out of here! SOMEONE! LET ME OUT OF HERE!" he shrieks. Again, he gets no response but the echo of his own voice. Bill lets himself drop on the ground - on what ground is to be found within one's mind - and presses both hands on his eye, trying to keep himself from screaming again. What leaves him is a keening sound.

Where are the others? Where have they gone? He's unable to see anything that's happening outside his prison, and it's something so _alien_ to him that he may as well have become blind. Have they been sucked back in the Nightmare Realm? If so, there is no hope they may find him - not with the gateway between dimension, the one he worked so hard to open, closed once again. They don't have the brains or the means to open it again.

This was not supposed to happen, it's _nothing_ like the future he foresaw. Why wouldn't the mortals just give up? They were supposed to give up. They were supposed to surrender and cower. They were supposed to let him do his thing and liberate their dimension. This was not supposed to-

_This should not have happened!_

_Shut up._

_YOU SHOULD NOT HAVE HAPPENED!_

"No no no _no_ shut up shut up SHUT UP!" Bill screeches, panic rearing up its head again. Whoever this voice belongs to, he doesn't want to hear it. He doesn't want to _listen_ , and he tries to run, knowing fully that he can't possible outrun something that is echoing in his own mind.

The attempt is short-lived as it's useless, because only moments later he slams against something that was hidden in the fog and falls back, mind still reeling. He looks up to see, through the milky white fog, the outline of a door - a door kept locked by heavy chains and a formidable padlock.

… A locked door? Why is there a locked door in _his_ mind? He has no memory of ever locking any memories away - but then again, that would be the point, wouldn't it?

Confusion overriding the lingering panic, Bill stands and reaches up to touch the padlock. He pauses for a moment, then he ignites his hand. It catches fire, and so do the chains; they flare brightly against his eye only for a moment before turning into ash and falling off, leaving the old wooden door unmarred.

For a moment - only a moment - he hesitates. There must be a reason if he decided to lock those memories away. Maybe he's better off leaving it alone. Maybe… maybe…

Bill scowls, and his hand closes on the handle. It's not like things can get any worse, can they? A peek won't change anything. There shouldn't be a locked door in his mind: he's had enough of being shut out of places, even if it was by his own will. If he doesn't like what he sees, he'll just close the door again. But at least he will know.

_They took everything else. I'll take back what I can._

Bill Cipher tightens his grip on the door's handle, and pushes it down.

* * *

_The door opens slowly, with the kind of creaking sound doors only make when everything is silent and you're trying not to be heard. Thankfully, his parents are sleeping at the end of the hallway and don't hear a thing - but Liam does, and the moment Bill peers inside a flashlight is pointed straight in his eye._

_"Hey!"_

_"Billy! What are you doing here?"_

_The light moves away and Bill opens his eye again, blinking a couple of times. Liam is sitting on the bed, the covers thrown up to his upper angle, a book on his crossed legs and the flashlight in his hand. Exactly as Bill expected to find him._

_"I want a story," he whispers, closing the door of Liam's room behind him as silently as he can, and steps closer._

_Liam frowns. "You should be in your room," he says, trying without much success to sound stern. He's always glad when Bill comes over, and he's terrible at hiding it._

_"My room is boring."_

_"You should be sleeping."_

_"You too!"_

_"I'm older. I can stay up longer, and… well, mom and dad will get mad if they find out you came here!"_

_"Aww, you're scared."_

_"Am not! I just-"_

_Bill turns his eye into a mouth just enough to blow a raspberry, then climbs on the bed and under the covers as well. "C'mon! Read me a story!" he says, propping himself up on his elbows and looking down at the book, only to frown when he realizes he's looking at a mathematics book. "Aw, seriously! Who wants to read this stuff?"_

_"Some people like knowing things," Liam remarks, but he closes the book and straightens himself. That causes the covers to raise up over Bill like a small tent. "Will you be quiet if I tell you a story?"_

_"A scary one!"_

_"The scariest I can think of. It's about a pesky little Triangle who wouldn't leave his big brother in peace..."_

_Liam tries, he really does, and some of his stories are actually really cool, but he can't manage to actually sound scary to save his life. Still, Bill makes sure to keep his eye wide while listening to look at least a bit unnerved, and he actually jumps a couple of times to make it look like he was startled. Liam always looks so proud of himself whenever that happens, and plus playing scared gives Bill an excuse to stay in his room for the night._

_"I don't wanna be all alone now!"_

_"You'll be fine, Bill."_

_"Come on! Let me stay!"_

_"No."_

_"Why not?"_

_"Because then I'd have to wake up early and get you in your room before mom and dad find out you're not there, that's why."_

_"I'll have a bad dream if I have to sleep alone! I'll wake up screaming and wake them up, and then they'll be cranky and will know you told me a scary story and-"_

_"Hey! That's blackmail!"_

_Liam tries to argue a bit, he always does, but never really means it - and, in the end, he lets Bill stay. Granted, trying to snuggle up when you happen to have angles can be a little tricky._

_"Don't get your angle in my eye again," Liam grumbles, and Bill blows a raspberry against his side just for the heck of it. "Eww! Stop doing that!"_

_Bill laughs a bit, but quietly, so that no one will hear, and finally yawns. It's starting to get late, after all. "Night," he mumbles, and doesn't notice the brief pause before Liam answers, pulling the covers up over them both._

_"... Goodnight, Billy."_

_They fall asleep within minutes, unaware of the universe's gears turning around them. In a matter of days, the date of Liam's Inspection will be chosen. In a matter of weeks, he will be no more and Bill will replace his not-so-scary stories with the forbidden tales of a Third Dimension he will leave behind. Their world - and the multiverse as a whole - will feel the ripples of that one day for a trillion years to come._

_But right there and then, none of it has happened. Within the walls of that tiny room, in a house like countless others in the Second Dimension, time may as well have stopped. They just sleep, resting close, in one crystallized eternal moment the future is not allowed to break._

_Not as long as_ he _has a say in it._

* * *

In the Third Dimension, in one galaxy among many, on a tiny planet among billions, two siblings stand together to face the future. Two brothers pick up where they left off, put together the pieces of their lives and reclaim something they thought they had lost. They all leave behind a town known to few, and something else even fewer dare speak of. Hidden away in the forest where the fabric of reality is at its thinnest, a hand stays stretched out in wait.

Within the stone cage, the screaming has ceased. The all-seeing eye remains closed. For the first time in a trillion years, Bill Cipher sleeps.

And dreams.

* * *

_Just a little more summer._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "It is part of the martyrdom which I endure for the cause of Truth that there are seasons of mental weakness, when Cubes and Spheres flit away into the background of scarce-possible existences; when the Land of Three Dimensions seems almost as visionary as the Land of One or None; nay, when even this hard wall that bars me from my freedom, these very tablets on which I am writing, and all the substantial realities of Flatland itself, appear no better than the offspring of a diseased imagination, or the baseless fabric of a dream."  
> \- A Square, Flatland.

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End file.
